Baptism with the Holy Spirit

This top­ic is giv­en spe­cial sig­nif­i­cance in the Charismatic/Pentecostal move­ment. Indeed, bap­tism with the Holy Spir­it is an impor­tant event in the life of a Chris­t­ian. We com­plete­ly agree with this, but we intend to share our belief in the fol­low­ing pages that God’s love for His chil­dren is impar­tial and full, imme­di­ate­ly when they accept His invi­ta­tion to fol­low Him. There­fore, the Holy Spir­it fills the heart of the believ­ers at the very moment of their repen­tance with­out any time delay. We intend to explain why we believe that this Holy Spir­it bap­tism as well as anoint­ing is an imme­di­ate response from God when a believ­er repents and is man­i­fest­ed through a changed life—the work of the Holy Spir­it. This is in con­trast to the main­stream Charismatic/Pentecostal belief which we con­sid­er to be erro­neous in this point.

The top­ic has been divid­ed into four broad sec­tions and will be fol­lowed by a conclusion.

1. Promis­es about the Holy Spir­it bap­tism in the New Tes­ta­ment (NT).
2. Is there any time delay for the Holy Spir­it baptism/anointing?
3. How is the Holy Spir­it baptism/anointing manifested?
4. Mis­in­ter­pret­ed pas­sages on Holy Spir­it baptism/anointing.

Promises about the Holy Spirit baptism in the New Testament (NT)

The term occurs in all the four gospels and is first men­tioned as the words of John the Baptist.

John the Bap­tist refers to Jesus as the one who is might­i­er than he him­self. He said that Jesus will bap­tize with the Holy Spir­it. John called the Jews for repen­tance and regret from their sins. But it would actu­al­ly be Jesus, who gives them the heav­en­ly pow­er through the Holy Spir­it to live god­ly lives while fol­low­ing His example.

On the day of Pen­te­cost (a Jew­ish fes­ti­val) in the year 30 A.D., this prophe­cy was ful­filled. The dis­ci­ples were ear­li­er hid­ing behind locked doors because of fear of the Jews (John 20:19). After they had received the Holy Spir­it on this very day they pro­claimed the gospel with great courage and wis­dom (Acts 2:14).

Is there any time delay for the Holy Spirit baptism/anointing?

This is a major point empha­sized by the Charismatic/Pentecostal teachings—existence of a delay between repen­tance and the Holy Spir­it bap­tism. Although some Pen­te­costal denom­i­na­tions do accept that the Holy Spir­it bap­tism can be at the very moment of repen­tance, these are nev­er­the­less con­sid­ered to be rather excep­tion­al cas­es. We would like to clear up in this sec­tion on the basis of Bib­li­cal pas­sages if there is any such delay.

Unique situation of Jesus’s immediate disciples: Existence of a delay between repentance and Holy Spirit baptism

“But when the Helper comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spir­it of truth, who pro­ceeds from the Father, he will bear wit­ness about me. And you also will bear wit­ness, because you have been with me from the begin­ning. (John 15:26–27)

Jesus promised His dis­ci­ples that He will send the Holy Spir­it from the Father. In this way, John the Baptist’s prophe­cy was still valid that it will be Jesus who will bap­tize with the Holy Spir­it. But accord­ing to Jesus, it would not hap­pen until he goes back.

Nev­er­the­less, I tell you the truth: it is to your advan­tage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. (John 16:7)

There­fore, Jesus saw it nec­es­sary to go to the Father before He sends the Holy Spir­it to His dis­ci­ples. This was in spite of the fact that the dis­ci­ples who were fol­low­ing Jesus had repent­ed already. Some of them actu­al­ly had been John the Baptist’s dis­ci­ples. John the gospel writer and the apos­tle inter­pret­ed the rea­son for this delay while quot­ing Jesus at the Jew­ish Feast of Taber­na­cles where Jesus spoke to the crowd.

On the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, “If any­one thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Who­ev­er believes in me, as the Scrip­ture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of liv­ing water.’” Now this he said about the Spir­it, whom those who believed in him were to receive, for as yet the Spir­it had not been giv­en, because Jesus was not yet glo­ri­fied. (John 7:37–39)

These pas­sages explain the unique sit­u­a­tion of the dis­ci­ples that although they were fol­low­ing Jesus hav­ing left every­thing for Him, they received the Holy Spir­it only lat­er, after Jesus had been glo­ri­fied. This ulti­mate­ly hap­pened on the day of Pen­te­cost in the year 30 A.D., while the dis­ci­ples were wait­ing just as Jesus com­mand­ed (Acts 1:4.5.8), actu­al­ly unaware of how Jesus’s promise was going to be manifested.

Christians who converted after Pentecost 30 A.D.: Holy Spirit baptism at repentance—fullness without time delay

Once the Holy Spir­it was giv­en on Pen­te­cost 30 A.D., repen­tance and Holy Spir­it bap­tism were no longer two sep­a­rate events. This is vis­i­ble in the promise Jesus made con­cern­ing the Holy Spir­it in his last night discourses.

“If you love me, you will keep my com­mand­ments. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you anoth­er Helper, to be with you for ever, even the Spir­it of truth, whom the world can­not receive, because it nei­ther sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you. […]
Jesus answered him, “If any­one loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. (John 14:15–17.23)

Jesus ini­tial­ly speaks about the Holy Spir­it who will be in the dis­ci­ples and lat­er in verse 22, about the Father and Him­self. This implies that it is the Tri­une God who makes His home in us when we receive the Holy Spir­it. Just as we can­not imag­ine to receive a part of the Father and a part of the Son (Jesus Christ) at repen­tance, nei­ther is the Holy Spir­it poured only par­tial­ly into the heart of a new con­vert. All that God wants from us is to love Him and hence, to keep His com­mands (verse 15).

The pour­ing out of the Holy Spir­it into a new convert’s heart is also a response of God out of His love for and his joy about a new­ly repent­ed soul.

… I tell you, there is rejoic­ing in the pres­ence of the angels of God over one sin­ner who repents. (Luke 15:10)

… because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spir­it, whom he has giv­en us. (Romans 5:5)

Holy Spirit at repentance: Is it baptism or not?

There are some Charismatic/Pentecostal teach­ings that try to har­mo­nize the Bib­li­cal pas­sages with their own belief by call­ing the giv­ing of the Holy Spir­it at repen­tance as some­thing else than the “anoint­ing that one receives lat­er.” We wish to refute this claim and show that the God of the Bible does not give only a reduced quan­ti­ty of His love to the one who yearns for Him.

Much of the dif­fi­cul­ty aris­es because in now-a-days “Chris­tian­i­ty,” repen­tance has lost its val­ue. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, in var­i­ous denom­i­na­tions, peo­ple are eas­i­ly accept­ed as Chris­tians if they say with mere words that they believe in Jesus as their sav­iour often with­out a clear change in their lives. This gives rise to intro­duc­ing anoth­er event when the per­son changes “com­plete­ly” and receives a “spe­cial anointing.”

In the Acts of the Apos­tles and in the oth­er let­ters of the NT we see a very clear respect for the words of Jesus as to who can be includ­ed in the Church or who should remain in the Church. There were clear mea­sures for repen­tance and also painful deci­sions as exclu­sion from the Church.

Repen­tance in the Bible is not a feel­ing but is based on truth and facts. True repen­tance means that one needs to assess his/her life and not try to defend his sins from the past. There is a clear wish in such a per­son to come to the light and be assessed also by oth­er Chris­tians and to give the task of jus­ti­fi­ca­tion entire­ly into Jesus’s hands, there­by, liv­ing out of God’s for­give­ness. When one repents, he does not want to live any­more as he did ear­li­er. In this state, although the believ­er yearns eager­ly for God, he might be weak due to his past sins for which he needs spe­cial sup­port from God and from the church.

There­fore there is now no con­dem­na­tion for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spir­it of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death …
… How­ev­er, you are not in the flesh but in the Spir­it, if indeed the Spir­it of God dwells in you. But if any­one does not have the Spir­it of Christ, he does not belong to Him …
… For all who are being led by the Spir­it of God, these are sons of God. For you have not received a spir­it of slav­ery lead­ing to fear again, but you have received a spir­it of adop­tion as sons by which we cry out, “Abba! Father!” … (Romans 8:1–17)

God gives His Spir­it ful­ly so that His chil­dren, includ­ing the new­ly con­vert­ed broth­er, expe­ri­ence the deep rela­tion­ship with Him that Paul describes in verse 15. Why would God do it only par­tial­ly just in the begin­ning when a new­born Chris­t­ian has to strug­gle strong­ly to live accord­ing to his new recog­ni­tions? Deny­ing the fact that God pours out the Holy Spir­it ful­ly shows that one does not con­nect repen­tance with a seri­ous deci­sion to turn away from sin and strive for holy life.

Some Charis­mat­ic denom­i­na­tions speak about a two-group Chris­tian­i­ty which is clear­ly reject­ed in the pas­sage above. Paul does speak about two kinds of peo­ple but clear­ly not about two groups of Chris­tians. Those who live accord­ing to the flesh can­not please God (verse 8) and are against God (verse 7) and liv­ing in this way, it leads to death (verse 6). This group of peo­ple are not Chris­tians. The Charis­mat­ic teach­ing defines “Chris­tians” with­out the Holy Spir­it bap­tism as flesh­ly Chris­tians which is not meant here in Rom 8 at all. Some groups like The Pen­te­costal Mis­sion go on to define dif­fer­ent heav­en­ly places for those who have/do not have the anoint­ing in the Holy Spir­it. These com­pli­cat­ed teach­ings are sim­ply attempts to appease those who do not yet have the “anoint­ing” as they say.

The rea­son giv­en by the Charismatics/Pentecostals for not yet receiv­ing the anoint­ing in such cas­es is often attrib­uted to the person’s sins. The empha­sis then is no longer on the need for the per­son to assess his life and ask for God’s for­give­ness. Unfor­tu­nate­ly, instead they sug­gest pray­ing and wait­ing for the anoint­ing of the Holy Spirit.

By con­trast the let­ters of Paul repeat­ed­ly empha­size the imme­di­ate fill­ing of Holy Spir­it in a believer’s life at the very moment of repentance.

In Him, you also, after lis­ten­ing to the mes­sage of truth, the gospel of your sal­va­tion. Hav­ing also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spir­it of promise, … (Eph­esians 1:13–14)

On the day of Pen­te­cost 30 A.D., Peter him­self preached to the Jews with bold­ness what they will receive as a response from God for their deci­sion to repent.

Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be bap­tized in the name of Jesus Christ for the for­give­ness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spir­it.” (Acts 2:38)

The sub-sec­tions that fol­low will fur­ther strength­en our claim that the giv­ing of the Holy Spir­it at repen­tance is in fact the baptism/anointing.

Holy Spirit is a person: No scope for partial filling

The Holy Spir­it is a per­son who can­not be divid­ed into parts like a mass of water. It is true that the work­ing of the Holy Spir­it is often com­pared in the Bible with that of water that revives, refresh­es, and quench­es one’s thirst. But such pas­sages nev­er attribute the fea­tures of a mass of water like divi­sion or accu­mu­la­tion to the Holy Spir­it. They nev­er describe God first giv­ing only a por­tion and lat­er the full extent. The OT pas­sages promis­ing the Holy Spir­it using the com­par­i­son with water always speak in terms of full­ness: Isa­iah 32:14–16; Isa­iah 44:1–5; Isa­iah 41:17–20;Isa­iah 58:11; Joel 3:18; Ezekiel 47:1–12.

The east­ern religions/philosophies that preach an imper­son­al God how­ev­er, often describe God’s being to be divis­i­ble and addi­tive, like ener­gy. This is very far from Chris­tian­i­ty, and is not the per­son­al God who revealed Him­self in the Bible.

Paul in his let­ter to Titus spoke about the sal­va­tion when one repents and what fol­lows immediately.

For we also once were fool­ish our­selves, dis­obe­di­ent, deceived, enslaved to var­i­ous lusts and plea­sures, spend­ing our life in mal­ice and envy, hate­ful, hat­ing one anoth­er. But when the kind­ness of God our Sav­ior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in right­eous­ness, but accord­ing to His mer­cy, by the wash­ing of regen­er­a­tion and renew­ing by the Holy Spir­it, whom He poured out upon us RICHLY through Jesus Christ our Sav­iour, so that being jus­ti­fied by His grace we would be made heirs accord­ing to the hope of eter­nal life. (Titus 3:3–7)

In the con­text Paul speaks about repen­tance. It is described how the tran­si­tion occurred from liv­ing in sins to being washed and renewed by the Holy Spir­it whom he poured out upon us rich­ly. This means that repen­tance and receiv­ing the Spir­it rich­ly (i.e., ful­ly, since the word rich­ness for God can­not mean that he gives the Spir­it just par­tial­ly but ful­ly) can­not be regard­ed as two sep­a­rate events, which may hap­pen with time delay.

If some­one has not received the Spir­it rich­ly, he is not washed, renewed, and regen­er­at­ed. As a con­se­quence, such a per­son is not saved, not jus­ti­fied and is not an heir of the eter­nal life (verse 7).

In anoth­er pas­sage Paul con­nects receiv­ing the Spir­it ful­ly with being a mem­ber of the church.

For even as the body is one and yet has many mem­bers, and all the mem­bers of the body, though they are many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spir­it we were all bap­tized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and we were all made to drink of one Spir­it. (1 Corinthi­ans 12:12–13)

The phrase “to be made to drink” is again an expres­sion of full­ness and express­es uni­ty in the Church as its mem­bers share in the same Spir­it. This is for every mem­ber of the body as soon as one becomes a mem­ber, i.e., when one repents and is accept­ed into the Church. As was already stat­ed above, the Spir­it is a per­son and can give him­self only com­plete­ly and not par­tial­ly. If he gives him­self to drink he does it ful­ly and NOT first just a sip of him­self and lat­er every­thing. This is also expressed in John’s gospel.

For He whom God has sent speaks the words of God; for He gives the Spir­it with­out mea­sure. (John 3:34)

If there were by any chance, two steps of receiv­ing the Holy Spir­it there should be two groups or two kinds of Chris­tians in the church accord­ing to the quan­ti­ty of the Spir­it they have. As men­tioned ear­li­er, 1 Corinthi­ans 12 does not give such a pic­ture about the Church at all. In the whole chap­ter, Paul says that each and every mem­ber of the Church is very pre­cious because the same Spir­it lives in him by whom he con­fess­es Jesus as his Lord and from whom he has received gifts (1 Corinthi­ans 12:3–11). There are dif­fer­ences in the gifts, in the min­istries and in the effects but Paul does not speak about dif­fer­ences in the quan­ti­ty of the Spir­it (hav­ing Him par­tial­ly or ful­ly) although it would be very appro­pri­ate to men­tion it in vers­es 4–6 if such a dis­tinc­tion exist­ed. All gifts in vers­es 8–10 are signs that some­one is filled with the Spirit—not only speak­ing in tongues, unlike the typ­i­cal Charis­mat­ic teach­ing that empha­sizes tongues as a clear sign that some­one is bap­tized with the Holy Spirit.

Some Charismatic/Pentecostal teach­ings also speak of “in-dwelling” and con­sec­u­tive­ly a con­tin­u­ous “in-fill­ing” of the Holy Spir­it. This is again based on the imag­i­na­tion of the Holy Spir­it being like a mass of water which has already been explained to be far from the Chris­t­ian under­stand­ing of God.

Being filled with the Holy Spirit: No waiting time in a Christian’s life

The teach­ing of a delayed baptism/anointing in the Holy Spir­it implies that there is a wait­ing time between repen­tance and this event. The Charismatic/Pentecostal teach­ings encour­age such “Chris­tians” to pray earnest­ly that they can receive the anoint­ing. Based on the pas­sage in Titus 3:3–7, point­ed out in an ear­li­er sub-sec­tion, a major prob­lem comes in under­stand­ing if such peo­ple are Chris­tians in the first place.

As explained ear­li­er, Rom 8:9 states that “any­one who does not have the Spir­it of Christ does not belong to Him.” Paul also admon­ish­es the Gala­t­ian Chris­tians, remind­ing them of the rea­son they received the Holy Spir­it (most of whom had a non-Jew­ish back­ground) who were in the dan­ger of adopt­ing Jew­ish cer­e­mo­ni­al laws.

This is the only thing I want to find out from you: did you receive the Spir­it by the works of the Law, or by hear­ing with faith? (Gala­tians 3:2)

This pas­sage fur­ther shows that the Chris­tians did not have to pray earnest­ly to receive the Holy Spir­it. It has been already explained that when one receives the Holy Spir­it, God gives His Spir­it ful­ly, not partially.

The rela­tion­ship with God starts at repen­tance through His dwelling in us by the Holy Spir­it. This rela­tion­ship can be strength­ened by our obe­di­ence (good deci­sions, devo­tion, and prayer) but also weak­ened by our dis­obe­di­ence. Expres­sions such as “be filled with the Spir­it” in Eph­esians 5:18 or “do not grieve the Holy Spir­it of God” in Eph­esians 4:30 show that it also strong­ly depends on us through our obe­di­ence, how much the Holy Spir­it can work in us.

Although one receives the Holy Spir­it when he becomes a Chris­t­ian, she/he still has the free will to sub­mit or dis­obey the Holy Spir­it that dwells in that per­son. Paul there­fore encour­ages the Chris­tians “to walk by the Spir­it,” just as they “live by the Spir­it” (Gala­tians 5:25).

The first Chris­tians were pray­ing fer­vent­ly just after Peter and John came back from fac­ing the threats from the Coun­cil and expe­ri­enced great strength­en­ing in their faith by the Holy Spirit:

… they were all filled with the Holy Spir­it and began to speak the word of God with bold­ness. (Acts 4:31)

We find the expres­sion “being filled with the Spir­it” also in oth­er sit­u­a­tions in Acts when the Holy Spir­it strength­ened some­one in a dif­fi­cult sit­u­a­tion: Acts 4:5–10; Acts 13:9–12. Being filled with the Spir­it in such cas­es has a dif­fer­ent mean­ing than, e.g., in Acts 2:4 or else­where when some­body repent­ed and received the Holy Spir­it (e.g., Acts 9:17). It is not the begin­ning of the rela­tion­ship with the Spir­it but a strength­en­ing of it and expe­ri­enc­ing His pow­er and help in a spe­cial way.

When we read about a Chris­t­ian that he was full of the Holy Spir­it it does not mean that he was bap­tized with the Spir­it while oth­ers were not but it means that by his obe­di­ence, the work of the Holy Spir­it was very vis­i­ble in his life, e.g., Acts 6:5—they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spir­it. It cer­tain­ly does not mean that the oth­er six broth­ers were not bap­tized with the Holy Spir­it in con­trast to Stephen.

How is the Holy Spirit’s baptism/anointing manifested?

This is the sec­ond major point of con­tention with the Charismatic/Pentecostal teach­ings that we would like to explain on the Bib­li­cal base. Some exam­ples can be seen clear­ly in the Acts of the Apos­tles. We would like to reit­er­ate here that the anoint­ing in the Holy Spir­it is a response of God, imme­di­ate­ly when one repents and yearns for God’s help to not live any­more in sins.

Newness of life

Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be bap­tized in the name of Jesus Christ for the for­give­ness of your sins; and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit …”
… So then, those who had received his word were bap­tized; and that day there were added about three thou­sand souls …
… and they began sell­ing their prop­er­ty and pos­ses­sions and were shar­ing them with all, as any­one might have need … (Acts 2:38–47)

The joy of hav­ing repent­ed and hav­ing received the “gift of the Holy Spir­it” (verse 38) was imme­di­ate­ly vis­i­ble in the lives of the new con­verts. They would not have ear­li­er been able to do on their own, all that they were doing as is men­tioned in vers­es 42–45. The free­dom from the world­ly things and their wish to share every­thing out of love, along with those who fol­low God was in per­fect har­mo­ny with the call of Jesus (Luke 9:23–25.58; John 15:12).

Standing up for God

Now when they saw the bold­ness of Peter and John, and per­ceived that they were une­d­u­cat­ed, com­mon men, they were aston­ished. And they rec­og­nized that they had been with Jesus. (Acts 4:13)

This was just one of the sev­er­al exam­ples when the dis­ci­ples who had been with Jesus, after hav­ing received the Holy Spir­it (and also His anoint­ing) sur­prised the edu­cat­ed rulers with their bold­ness. This is in con­trast to the very same dis­ci­ples who were behind locked doors out of fear of Jews (John 20:19), when they had not yet received the Holy Spir­it. It was the Holy Spir­it empow­er­ing them that they were able to keep the words of Jesus in Luke 9:26 (to stand up for Jesus). It was also due to this strength that Stephen did not fear the Jews but spoke bold­ly and kept a lov­ing and thank­ful atti­tude even to the point of death.

And fix­ing their gaze on him (Stephen), all who were sit­ting in the Coun­cil saw his face like the face of an angel …
… When they had dri­ven him out of the city, they began ston­ing him; and the wit­ness­es laid aside their robes at the feet of a young man named Saul. They went on ston­ing Stephen as he called on the Lord and said, “Lord Jesus, receive my spir­it!” Then falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them!” Hav­ing said this, he fell asleep. (Acts 6:15–7:60)

In the let­ter to the Hebrews, the writer reminds the Jew­ish Chris­tians about the suf­fer­ings they endured even in mate­r­i­al things when they repent­ed. This would not have been pos­si­ble either with­out the strength they received through the full­ness of the Holy Spir­it when they were enlight­ened. They are encour­aged in this pas­sage to per­se­vere in Him and not to expect some­thing espe­cial­ly new now!

But remem­ber the for­mer days, when, after being enlight­ened, you endured a great con­flict of suf­fer­ings, part­ly by being made a pub­lic spec­ta­cle through reproach­es and tribu­la­tions, and part­ly by becom­ing shar­ers with those who were so treat­ed. For you showed sym­pa­thy to the pris­on­ers and accept­ed joy­ful­ly the seizure of your prop­er­ty, know­ing that you have for your­selves a bet­ter pos­ses­sion and a last­ing one. There­fore, do not throw away your con­fi­dence, which has a great reward. (Hebrews 10:32–35)

Example of Paul’s repentance

… As he (Paul) was trav­el­ling, it hap­pened that he was approach­ing Dam­as­cus, and sud­den­ly a light from heav­en flashed around him; and he fell to the ground and heard a voice say­ing to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you per­se­cut­ing Me?” And he said, “Who are You, Lord?” And He said, “I am Jesus whom you are per­se­cut­ing, …” (vers­es 3–5)
… Now there was a dis­ci­ple at Dam­as­cus named Ana­nias; … (verse 10)
So Ana­nias depart­ed and entered the house, and after lay­ing his hands on him said, “Broth­er Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on the road by which you were com­ing, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spir­it.” And imme­di­ate­ly there fell from his eyes some­thing like scales, and he regained his sight, and he got up and was bap­tized; … (vers­es 17–18)
… and imme­di­ate­ly he (Paul) began to pro­claim Jesus in the syn­a­gogues, say­ing, “He is the Son of God.” All those hear­ing him con­tin­ued to be amazed, and were say­ing, “Is this not he who in Jerusalem destroyed those who called on this name, and who had come here for the pur­pose of bring­ing them bound before the chief priests?” (vers­es 20–21)

The above men­tioned pas­sage speaks for itself that in the case of Paul, being filled with the Holy Spir­it was not accom­pa­nied imme­di­ate­ly with speak­ing in tongues (unlike what the typ­i­cal Charis­mat­ic the­o­ry states) or any oth­er vis­i­ble gift of the Holy Spir­it when Ana­nias laid his hands on him. This is in spite of the fact that Paul did speak in tongues, in fact even more than oth­er Chris­tians (1 Corinthi­ans 14:18).

Example of Cornelius

Cor­nelius was a Roman cen­tu­ri­on with­in a decade after the Chris­t­ian church came into exis­tence in a town near Jerusalem called Cae­sarea. He was not a Jew by birth but still was a devout man fear­ing the God of the Jews along with his entire house­hold (Acts 10:1–2). God led Peter to his house­hold to preach the gospel and the result had a sig­nif­i­cant pio­neer­ing impact on the Church con­cern­ing the uni­ver­sal­i­ty of Jesus’s gospel. Until then, all Chris­tians had basi­cal­ly a Jew­ish background.

While Peter was still speak­ing these words, the Holy Spir­it fell upon all those who were lis­ten­ing to the mes­sage. All the cir­cum­cised believ­ers who came with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spir­it had been poured out on the Gen­tiles also. For they were hear­ing them speak­ing with tongues and exalt­ing God … (Acts 10:44–46)

It is notice­able that the Holy Spir­it was poured out at the very event of the first Gen­tile family’s repen­tance. It is worth men­tion­ing here that the bap­tism or anoint­ing in the Spir­it was received before the water bap­tism (verse 47). This also con­tra­dicts the typ­i­cal Charis­mat­ic teach­ing con­cern­ing the sequence being: repen­tance, water bap­tism, and then Holy Spirit’s baptism.

Speaking in tongues: Was it the only sign for the Holy Spirit’s anointing?

As is evi­dent from the exam­ple of Paul’s repen­tance, the bap­tism in the Holy Spir­it was not nec­es­sar­i­ly fol­lowed by speak­ing in tongues. In fact, in 1 Cor 12 (esp. vers­es 1 Corinthi­ans 12:8–10 and vers­es 1 Corinthi­ans 12:27–30), tongues appear only as one of the many oth­er gifts of the Holy Spir­it. Besides, this pas­sage also shows that not all have the gift of tongues. It is there­fore wrong to say that one receives the anoint­ing of the Holy Spir­it only if he has received the gift of tongues.

Passages misinterpreted concerning Holy Spirit baptism/anointing

Samaritans’ repentance: Was there any time delay in their Holy Spirit baptism?

Philip went down to the city of Samaria … when they believed Philip preach­ing the good news about the king­dom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were being bap­tized, men and women alike …
Peter and John … came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spir­it. For He had not yet fall­en upon any of them; they had sim­ply been bap­tized in the name of the Lord Jesus … (Acts 8:5, 12, 15–16)

As was men­tioned ear­li­er about the evan­ge­lism at the house of Cor­nelius being a his­toric event, so was the con­ver­sion of the Samar­i­tans who were not con­sid­ered to be God’s peo­ple and fel­low broth­ers by Jews of Galilee and Judea. We can get a brief insight into the sep­a­ra­tion that exist­ed among the Jews and Samar­i­tans through the talk that Jesus had with the Samar­i­tan woman in John 4.

The preach­ing of Philip led to their repen­tance and this was valid and accept­able to God. But for the uni­ty of the Church (which had only Jew­ish Chris­tians till then) and con­fir­ma­tion of such an event, it was nec­es­sary that Peter and John as Jesus’s apos­tles (who were also the pil­lars of the Church) vis­it and acknowl­edge them as fel­low broth­ers. The sig­nif­i­cance of their arrival was to con­firm the uni­ty with the new con­vert­ed Christians.

Based on our dis­cus­sion in ear­li­er sec­tions, God must have giv­en His Spir­it to them that they can stand firm in their new faith. The ques­tion aris­es there­fore, what is meant by “that they might receive the Holy Spir­it” when Peter and John “came down and prayed for them” and also that the Spir­it “had not yet fall­en upon any of them.” Did they and oth­ers (who saw them) expe­ri­ence some­thing espe­cial­ly mirac­u­lous in this situation?

As is evi­dent from verse 18, “Simon saw that the Spir­it was bestowed through the lay­ing on of the apostle’s hands,” there was a vis­i­ble event that hap­pened here. There­fore, verse 17 “they were receiv­ing the Holy Spir­it” needs to be under­stood as receiv­ing the gift of the Holy Spir­it, most prob­a­bly speak­ing in tongues. The receiv­ing of this super­nat­ur­al gift con­firmed that they had the same Spir­it that the apos­tles and oth­er Jew­ish Chris­tians had till then. This con­fir­ma­tion was about the work of the Spir­it in their lives and was not the moment of pour­ing out of the Spir­it in their hearts. The receiv­ing of the gift was from God and not from Peter and John.

John the Baptist’s 12 disciples

“… Did you receive the Holy Spir­it when you believed?” And they said to him (Paul), “No we have not even heard whether there is a Holy Spir­it …” (Acts 19:2)

These dis­ci­ples were bap­tized into John’s bap­tism and were fol­low­ers of John the Baptist’s teach­ing, either through John direct­ly, or most prob­a­bly through John’s oth­er dis­ci­ples. It is pos­si­ble to imag­ine that they were men liv­ing in Asia Minor and had repent­ed from their sins and had been try­ing to live a right­eous life after hav­ing heard about John the Bap­tist. Although John the Bap­tist point­ed to Jesus being the one to whom his dis­ci­ples should turn to (John 3:28–30), not many imme­di­ate­ly fol­lowed or under­stood it. These dis­ci­ples whom Paul met in Eph­esus did not even hear “whether there is a Holy Spir­it,” a clear indi­ca­tion that they did not yet have any con­fronta­tion with a Church or the right Chris­t­ian teach­ings. There­fore, they can­not be Chris­tians although they are called dis­ci­ples (verse 1) and Paul even reck­ons them to have believed (verse 2). They heard about Chris­tian­i­ty for the first time through Paul, and imme­di­ate­ly accept­ed it. There­fore, it is under­stand­able that they were bap­tized and their new belief in Jesus along with the con­se­quent receiv­ing of the Holy Spir­it was also con­firmed to them when they spoke in tongues and prophesied.

Their sit­u­a­tion is sig­nif­i­cant­ly dif­fer­ent to Apollos’s sit­u­a­tion in the vers­es just before in Acts 18:24–28, although he also knew only the bap­tism of John. Some of these aspects are:

• He had been instruct­ed in the way of the Lord.
• He was speak­ing and teach­ing accu­rate­ly the things con­cern­ing Jesus.
• He was fer­vent in spir­it (just like in Rom 12:11, a fea­ture that is asso­ci­at­ed with Christians).
• He spoke bold­ly in the synagogue.
• On hear­ing him, Priscil­la and Aquila took him and explained the way of God more accu­rate­ly.

These are all fea­tures of a per­son led and made bold by God’s Spir­it, hav­ing a much clear­er under­stand­ing of the teach­ings of Jesus than the twelve men­tioned ear­li­er and was able to quick­ly come to uni­ty with broth­ers who were already in the Church from whom he was also hum­ble to learn the way of God more accu­rate­ly. Con­se­quent­ly in Apollos’s case, there is no men­tion of any water bap­tism or even a spe­cial sign of hav­ing received the Holy Spir­it unlike the dis­tinct vis­i­ble sign among the twelve dis­ci­ples of John.

Believers’ prayer and God’s response

… how much more will your heav­en­ly Father give the Holy Spir­it to those who ask Him? … (Luke 11:13)

Jesus teach­es his dis­ci­ples in this pas­sage to know the grace and immense mer­cy of God to respond to those who cry out to Him for help. Jesus con­trasts it with men who in spite of being evil also know how to give good gifts to their own chil­dren. The Greek text for the above pas­sage says just as it has been quot­ed above and does not say “heav­en­ly Father give the Holy Spir­it to those who ask Him for the Spir­it” as many Charismatic/Pentecostal groups inter­pret and orga­nize spe­cial meet­ings to “ask God” for the Holy Spirit.

The par­al­lel pas­sage in Matthew 7:11 sub­sti­tutes the words “Holy Spir­it” with “good things.” This con­firms that Jesus’s inten­tion with the above pas­sage was not that we should request God for giv­ing His Spir­it again and again, but that we can ask God with trust for things that are in His will and that God gives all the nec­es­sary help through the Holy Spirit—through fel­low­ship, strength­en­ing, and lead­ing of His Spir­it. An exam­ple for such a prayer is in Acts 4 where the dis­ci­ples did not ask for the Holy Spir­it but for God’s sup­port and God strength­ened them through His Spir­it, whom he already had poured out on them.

Before the day of the feast of Pentecost, Jesus said: “Receive the Holy Spirit”

… He breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spir­it …” (John 20:22)

As was explained ear­li­er about Jesus’s glo­ri­fi­ca­tion and going away being a pre-req­ui­site for the send­ing of the Holy Spir­it (John 7:39 and John 16:7), this pas­sage should be con­sid­ered in the same light. In John 20, Jesus was still among His dis­ci­ples after his res­ur­rec­tion and had not yet ascend­ed to the Father in heav­en and there­fore, the dis­ci­ples sure­ly did not receive the Holy Spir­it in this sit­u­a­tion. The dis­ci­ples were rejoic­ing at the appear­ance of Jesus after being hope­less fol­low­ing his cru­ci­fix­ion. Jesus had to remind them of his last night dis­cours­es before his arrest in which he shared with them that he would soon leave the earth although he pre­sent­ed him­self to them after his res­ur­rec­tion. He also want­ed them to know that they would not be left as orphans but would have the Coun­sel­lor sent to them. The act of breath­ing was sym­bol­ic to help them under­stand the con­nec­tion between Jesus and the Holy Spir­it whom they were to receive some days lat­er (Acts 1:5).

Summary

When we respond to God’s call with the deci­sion to entrust our lives to Him, how­ev­er weak we may be, He empow­ers us with all that He has to offer that we can expe­ri­ence His love, peace, and pow­er in fight­ing against sins. He makes it pos­si­ble through His Spir­it whom He gives rich­ly to those who yearn for Him at their repen­tance. A Chris­t­ian does not have to wait for being bap­tized or anoint­ed by the Holy Spir­it as God gives Him­self com­plete­ly in the rela­tion­ship to His beloved child who repents. With­out repen­tance, we can­not be His chil­dren and can­not be his fol­low­ers, Christians!