This message was preached at Word Of Grace Church on May 30th 2021 by Colin D via zoom. For the audio please click here. To listen to the worship please click here.
We
covered the day of Pentecost when the Holy Spirit was poured out and I shared
last week the baptism with the Holy Spirit is needed to infuse power into the
life of a Christian. Today, we're going to look at more about how we can be
filled with the spirit, be baptized with the spirit and for that what we're
going to do this morning is I'm gonna show you a couple of instances, from the
Old Testament, on how important the baptism with the holy spirit is. Let me
just turn to scripture in Romans chapter 15 verse 4.
For everything that was written in the past was written to
teach us, so that through the endurance taught in the Scriptures and the encouragement they provide we might have hope.
In Genesis 11, there is something called the
Tower of Babel. Today we have hundreds, if not, we have thousands of
languages, and have you ever thought or said, hey, what are these languages,
how they are so different from one another. And the answer to that is found in
Genesis 11. Genesis chapter 11, it says,
Now the whole world had one language
and a common speech. As people moved
eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there. They said to each
other, Come, let's make bricks and bake them thoroughly. They used brick instead
of stone, and tar for mortar. Then they
said, Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the
heavens so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be
scattered over the face of the whole earth.
So their goal, as they came together in unity,
one language, one purpose was to build a city to be together. Not to be
scattered and build a tower. That would reach up to the Heavens to God, but see
what happens in verse 5, But the Lord
came down to see the city and the tower the people were building. The Lord
said, If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this,
then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. In this case,
what they wanted to do was not a good thing.
Remember, the original command was
to Adam and Eve was to go and fill the
Earth and subdue the Earth. That was God's command. It wasn't to settle but it
was to scatter. And these guys said, let's
just stay together and enjoy life. And the second thing they wanted to do was
to make a name for themselves. This is
what God says. Come, let us go down and
confuse their language so they will not understand each other. So the Lord
scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the
city.
So, the Lord scattered them from there to over all the earth and they
stopped building the city. That is why it is called the Babel of Babel because
the Lord confused, the language of the whole world from there. The Lord
scattered them over the face of the whole earth. Now, you know, some people say
that this is only a story. But I tell
you, as Christians, we know that the word of God is true. And that's how we
have people moved across the earth and we have different languages.
Now
this is what happened, some of these people went to China. People started to use picture languages, and if you go into Chinese
and see, the word for' create' in Chinese (Remember Chinese don't use alphabets,
they use pictorial forms to write).
So
the word for 'create' is made up for the pictures of mud, life and someone
walking.That's the word for create. The word for devil is made up of, man, a
garden and a picture for the secret. That's the word for devil. A man, a garden,
and the picture for secret. So the Devil is a secret person in the garden.
Their word for tempter is made up of the word for the devil, plus, two trees,
and the picture for "cover". So, the tempter is the devil, two trees and cover.
The word for boat, the word for " boat" is made up of the word for vessel or a container,
mouth and eight. So boat in China and the Chinese language is a vessel for
eight people. As was Noah's Ark. Isn't that incredible? We can construct the
whole of Genesis 1 to 11 from the Chinese language. This is just to show you that what we believe in is
true. Even if you look at secular sources, they will attest to the truth of
what we believe.
So what
is Babel to do with the baptism with the Holy Spirit? Remember God came down
because these people were united. So he was going to scatter them across the
face of the Earth. They spoke one language. He brought in, multi, multiplicity
of languages. So that they couldn't understand one another. And so they moved
out.
Now, in
Acts chapter 2, when the Holy Spirit was poured out at Pentecost, we see God
reversing some of the things that happened at Babel. There were people from all
the different parts of the world -Jews, who had come there to Jerusalem for the
Feast of Pentecost. And what do they do? They were also amazed and it also
confused them because they could hear Galilean Jews speaking in different foreign
languages and they could understand them.
Acts chapter, 2 verse 7 says: Utterly
amazed, they asked: Arent all these who are speaking Galileans? Then how is it that each of us hears them in
our native language? So you see
that, what happened at Babel was reversed on the day of Pentecost when the Holy
Spirit was poured out upon the 120 who had gathered with the Apostles, they all began to speak in different
tongues and, and people from different nations could understand what they were
saying, and that is what God was doing here. What he had done in Babel was
confusing the languages.
He now, broad unity, he brought these people together
to hear the gospel. We're going to look at the second and, God is doing the
same thing. Here, in the sense of now- He wants to build a city. He wants to
build a city that's happening in Revelation but He wants us to go across the
whole of the world. That's been Jesus's command- go and make disciples of all
nations. But now we are going with the blessing of God -with the holy spirit
being poured out.
We can see a similar incident of
an Old Testament event being reversed in Acts chapter 2, in the giving of the
law. Pentecost is 50, that's what it means, 50 days. And you know, these Jews,
celebrated Pentecost, 50 days after the Passover. In Exodus chapter 32, the
law was given to the Jews. 50 days, after the Passover, they came out of Egypt
and fifty days they are in the desert and then God gave them the law. And in
Exodus chapter 32 we see this happening. In verse 15, Moses
turned and went down the mountain with the two tablets of the covenant
law in his hands. They were inscribed on both sides, front and
back. The tablets were the work
of God; the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets. When Joshua heard the noise of the people shouting, he
said to Moses, “There is the sound of war in the camp.” Moses replied:“It is not
the sound of victory,
it
is not the sound of defeat;
it
is the sound of singing that I hear.”When Moses approached the camp and saw the
calf and the dancing, his anger burned and he threw the tablets
out of his hands, breaking them to pieces at the foot of the mountain.
Verse 27 says. Then he
said to them, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says:
‘Each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth through the camp from
one end to the other, each killing his brother and friend and neighbour.’” 28 The
Levites did as Moses commanded, and that day about three thousand of the people
died.
And you know what happened -the law brings death,
3,000 people died that day and the reason is their idolatry. They made a golden
calf and worshipped it saying it brought them up out of Egypt. God hates
idolatry and that day 3,000 people were killed. But in Acts chapter 2 with the coming of the Holy
Spirit, on the day of Pentecost, the holy spirit is poured out and Peter
proclaims the gospel and (Acts chapter 2 verse 41) those who accepted his
message were baptized and 3000 people were added to the church.
So the gift of the Holy Spirit is
very, very important. We're going to
look at one more example, in the New Testament, of the giving of the Holy
Spirit upon a group of people. Acts chapter 19, it says Paul found some people who look like believers. And
so this is what happened to Paul when was travelling and he saw a group
disciples. While Apollos was at
Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at
Ephesus. There he found some disciples 2 and
asked them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when[a] you
believed?” e.
Did you receive the Holy Spirit? When
you believed or after you believe the some translations say. They answered, “No, we have not even heard
that there is a Holy Spirit.”
3 So Paul asked, “Then what baptism did you
receive?”
“John’s baptism,”
they replied.
4 Paul said, “John’s baptism was a baptism
of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that
is, in Jesus.” 5 On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of
the Lord Jesus. 6 When Paul placed his hands on them, the Holy
Spirit came on them, and they spoke in tongues[b] and
prophesied. 7 There were about twelve men in all.
He
realized that they had only heard the pre-Christian message of John's baptism and
they were not believers yet. They were
Seekers. And so he corrected them and he shared the full Gospel with them. After
hearing the gospel, they were baptized.
Remember, last time I shared about three different types of references
baptisms, they were immersed, in water, and believed in Jesus, the next step
was Paul placed his hands, and then the Holy Spirit came on them and they spoke
in tongues and prophesied and they were 12 of them. So first they heard the
gospel became born again, baptized in water and then Paul places hands on them.
And they spoke in tongues and prophesied, they were baptized with the Holy
Spirit. And that seems to be the normal sequence of how things happened. Now,
you may be sitting down here and say, I heard the gospel. I give my life to
Jesus,.I was baptised in water but Baptism in the Holy Spirit, I don't know
about that. And we're gonna answer a few questions do that. And how do we know
when we receive the Holy Spirit? We have to receive it by faith.
Ephesians 1:13, 14 And
you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of
truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in
him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the
redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory. Like
all the important and official documents are sealed, Paul is saying that the Holy
Spirit is a seal attesting to the authenticity of your conversion. The baptism
with the Holy Spirit is where people can see that you are truly born again. The
second thing is He is a deposit guarantee of our inheritance.
Paul says here is
that; the Holy Spirit is a seal that demonstrates and proves that you truly are
a follower of Christ. And the Holy Spirit is a deposit. If you receive the Holy
Spirit, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, it's a deposit, concerning the
inheritance that is in store for you. We got to seek the baptism of the Holy
Spirit because he's a seal and he's a deposit knowing that when I have received
this deposit, I'm going to receive my full inheritance. Now how do we receive
the Holy Spirit? Do we need to do something? How do we receive it? Let's look
at a couple of verses in Galatians.
In Galatians chapter 3, verse 5 tells us So again I ask, does God give you his Spirit and
work miracles among you by the works of the law, or by your believing what
you heard? We can never live a good enough life to earn the Holy
Spirit. We just can't make it. You have to rely on Jesus for that. We
receive the Holy Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit when believe the gospel by faith.
Verse 13 says Christ redeemed us from the curse of the
law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written: “Cursed
is everyone who is hung on a pole. He redeemed us in order that the blessing
given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus so that
by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit.
The Bible says here that He redeemed us,
that's what Jesus did so that the blessing given to Abraham, all the promises
given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles. That's us through Christ Jesus. So
we can receive the blessings of Abraham. We are spiritual descendants. And we
can say, I can hold on to God's promises
to Abraham through Christ Jesus. One of the blessings, the most important one
is this promise of the spirit which is not just the Holy Spirit but the baptism
with the Holy Spirit. Believe that God wants to bless you. He wants to pour out
his holy spirit upon you. It's not by observing the law. It's not by you're keeping
the commandments; it's by believing in Jesus.
The
second thing is to turn to John chapter 7: 37 and 39. On
the last and greatest day of the festival, Jesus stood and said in a loud
voice, “Let anyone who is thirsty come
to me and drink. 38 Whoever believes in
me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from
within them.”[c] 39 By
this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to
receive. Up to that time the Spirit had not been given, since Jesus had
not yet been glorified.
If you believe, God wants to give you his holy
spirit. The second thing is, it says that if anyone is thirsty, we've got to be
thirsty. Let's be thirsty and say to the Lord: I can't do anything without you apart from you
Lord. I am thirsty for you. Would you
give me more of your Holy Spirit? When we go to Jesus declare who He really
is, streams of living water will flow from
within us.
The
third thing. Luke 11 tells us Which of you fathers if your
son asks for[f] a
fish, will give him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an
egg, will give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you
are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your
Father in heaven gives the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
A
father is waiting to pour out the Holy Spirit, His promise. He wants to give
us the Holy Spirit. What is He looking for? He wants us to believe. He wants us
to be thirsty. He wants us to come to Jesus. He wants us to ask for things.
Believe, be thirsty. Come to Jesus, ask, that's what we need to do. As we do
that, the Holy Spirit will be poured out upon us. And now, how do I know that
I've been baptized with the Holy Spirit? Instances where people were filled
with the Holy Spirit are recorded in scripture three times. The people spoke in
tongues, they prophesied, or they declared the wonders of God. That's what
happened, three times. And so, that's what we've got to do. We've got to
believe that as we pray for the Holy Spirit, God will fill us. He will give us
the gift of tongues, not just the gift of tongues, the gift of prophecy, and we
will declare His praises.
If you want to see miracles, signs, wonders, and
the power of God -we need the Holy Spirit. I hope you're hungry and I hope
you're thirsty. So this morning let’s turn to Jesus. Let's praise the Lord for
He has been planning this from Genesis 11 Babel episode. Now he's giving us a language
to speak to God. So can we pray this morning? Can we come to Jesus by faith? I
like you all to just hold out your hands to Jesus. Put your hands up. Say,
Lord, I'm thirsty; I want to be filled with your Holy Spirit. I want the gift
of tongues. Let's hold on to our Father in heaven. We lift our hands to God as
a sign that we are thirsty for him and pray for the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
Word of Grace is an Evangelical (Born Again), Spirit-filled (Charismatic), Reformed, English speaking church in Pune that upholds the Bible as God's inspired Word for life. We are a church community that has people from every part of India and parts of the world. We are here to put the Great Command and the Great Commission into practice by equipping and releasing every member into works of service. Word of Grace is a part of a wider international family of Churches called RegionsBeyond.To know more about us please log onto www.wordofgracechurch.org.
