Baptism ofthe Holy Spirit pt. 2

Dear Pastor Lawyer,

I recently read your recent post "Baptism of The Holy Spirit" on your blog. Interesting story.

I find some errors in your response to Bob however. It appears you didn't pray in tongues and ask for revelation knowledge of the scriptures before you wrote your response.


Well to be honest with you I don't have the gift of interpretation and Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14:2 that because the person speaking in another language is speaking to God, "no one understands him" and after a rather lengthy discourse on the unintelligibility of tongues, he says that unless there is an interpreter, our minds are unfruitful (1 Cor. 14:6-17). Based on this, your assessment of my not praying in tongues for direction would be correct. I cannot pray for a thing, if I don't know if I'm praying for a thing. I hope this makes sense.

On the other hand, I pray often that God would fill me with "the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding" (Col 1:9). I also pray according to Phillipians 1:9-11 that my "love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ-- to the glory and praise of God." I think God is doing a wonderful job in me and I really can't figure out why anyone would want to be blessed in any other way.

But thank you for pointing this out to me.


(2 Timothy 3:16 KJV) ALL scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: Therefore none should carry any heavier weight than another.


You chose a great passage to begin with. The problem is that your conclusion does not follow from your passage. In other words, because all Scripture is inspired and profitable... does not mean that therefore all Scripture is useful in the same ways. Nor does it mean that you should read and understand all Scripture in the same way. For example, I read Ephesians 2:8-9 in an exactly literal way (according to its context) and I read Psalm 17:8 with a poetic understanding (according to its context). My point is that God clearly does not have an eye, nor does he have wings. He is spirit. When we read passages that talk about his wings, we automatically read them with an understanding that the author is using hyperbole, or metaphor to tell us something about God.

Another point I would like to make about the Psalm passage is that if you were to take the part about the wings literally in the same way you would about our salvation being by Grace through faith, as in the Ephesians passage, you would find yourself slipping into heresy. God does not have wings and you would be in error to say that he does (in a literal sense).

To get back to your point. All Scripture is inspired, but not all Scripture should read the same as all other Scripture. My point in the article is that didactic passages (like Ephesians 2:8,9) should be given more weight than narrative passages (such as the first part of Acts 2). This is not to say that Acts 2 is not part of Scripture or that it wasn't spoken by God -- it is and it was. I'm just saying that different contexts need to be read differently than one another.


2. Remember that these books and verses were originally just a letter, no chapters and verses. Therefore one needs to look back into Acts 1 for what Jesus told His disciples to do prior to the account of it in Acts 2 that you quoted. In your own words read in context.


Amen! I'm not sure what your point is here though. In 1:7-8, Jesus told the disciples that they would receive power when the Holy Spirit came upon them. The point I was trying to make in my article wasn't that the Holy Spirit didn't come upon them, or that they didn't receive power. My point was that they weren't saved in the NT understanding of salvation until the Holy Spirit came upon them and they received power, etc.


3. The Bible clearly shows a baptism of the Holy Spirit after the new birth or baptism into Christ: (Acts 19:2 KJV) He said unto them, Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed? And they said unto him, We have not so much as heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.


In the original draft of the my article I had used this passage, but because of space had to take it out. This passage does not say that the disciples were Christians. In fact it says that they were baptized into John (v. 3). They were John's disciples, it isn't even clear that they had heard about Jesus. They were prepared by John and so when they heard about the one whom John was preparing them for, they believed and were baptized (in water) into Jesus. At the same time (when Paul touched them), the Holy Spirit came upon them (v. 6).

The text does not say that they were Christians before they received the Holy Spirit. It says they were disciples of John until they heard about Jesus, and then when Paul touched them, they received the Holy Spirit. Thus, if we take Titus 3:5 as our base for understanding what was happening, we see that they became Christians when Paul touched them and they were "saved through the washing [another word for baptized] of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit".


4. While I agree with Titus 3:5, I think you should take a good look at John 3:3 and then Romans 10:9-10 also.


I agree with you. I didn't have time to use all the passages the Bible uses to describe the process of becoming a Christian. I'm sorry.

However, your passages don't do anything to change my central point. The Baptism of the Spirit is what saves us. It is what Jesus meant by "born again (or, born from above)". The person can't be born again unless the Spirit does it to and in him. There is no sense in which a person can cause himself to be born, the first time or the second. That is just silly. But you already knew that.

As for the Romans 10 passage, I have no problem with that either. A person cannot say that Jesus is Lord except by the Spirit of God (1 Cor. 12:3). So, a person cannot be a saved person unless he has the Spirit of God. Romans 3 tells us that no one seeks after God (v. 11), Ephesians 2:1 tells us that before we were saved (by the Holy Spirit), we were dead in our sins. We cannot come to God unless he draws us (John 6:44). Romans 1-4 also tells us that no non-Christian wants to come to God because we are all actively rebelling against him. He is our enemy and we are his.

Thank you for bringing up these passages, though. They helped me to re-think the wonderful, glorious salvation our Lord has provided for us.


5. Then we have (Mark 16:15-18 KJV) And he said unto them, 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. And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

Notice that it is only those who believe that will do these things and included is speaking in tongues. Also notice that He did NOT limit it to His disciples or pastors or priests, but to ALL who believe!! Of course you have to believe.


My point as explained above is that a man cannot believe unless God does something in him first and that something is the Baptism of the Holy Spirit and that something is the first stages of the event of salvation.


One must not allow the doctrines of men taught in theological cemetaries to cloud what the Word of God clearly says.

(2 Peter 2:1-2 KJV) But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of.

Paul himself warned us: (Galatians 1:8-9 KJV) But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, If any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed.

Oh and remember; Teacher, Pastors, and the like shall receive the greater judgement. Be sure of what you teach.


These are good warnings. Thank you very much for reminding me. Thank you again for responding to my article. It’s often when God's children rub against each other that they grow in their understanding of who he is and how great his grace is to us who believe.

I hope this helps,

Pastor Lawyer