and deaths can tell tell Jehovah's
grand design to redeem our souls from hell tell Jehovah's grand
design to redeem our souls from hell All my sins on Christ were laid. My offense was reckoned His. He the great atonement made. My offense was reckoned His. He the great atonement made. fully I am justified free from
sin and more than free guiltless sins for me he died righteous
sins he lived for me guiltless sins for me he died ♪ Righteous
sins he lived for me ♪ ♪ Jesus now to thee I bow ♪ ♪ Let thy
praise my tongue employ ♪ ♪ Say unto the utmost now ♪ ♪ Who can
speak my heartfelt joy ♪ ♪ Saved unto thee utmost now ♪ ♪ Who
can speak my heartfelt joy ♪ Aren't you glad that we have a Savior
that saved us and imputed us with his righteousness? He lived
for us. You know, living in this life,
if anybody's been a Christian any length of time knows that
the struggle that we have with sin, and we can never measure
up, we'll never measure up, but yet we had one who lived for
us, and then we also had one who died for us, and everything
that he accomplished in that is put to our account, as if
we actually did it. And so, What a wonderful grace
that it is to have sovereign grace given. Turn with me now,
if you would, to hymn number 225. 225. We'll sing this to
the tune of I Love Thy Kingdom, Lord. Faith is a precious grace where it is bestowed. It boasts of celestial birth
and is the gift of God. Jesus, it owns a king and all
atoning priests. It claims no merits of its own. but looks for all in Christ. To Him it leads the soul when
filled with deep distress, flies to the fountain of His blood
and trusts His righteousness. ♪ Since tis thy work alone ♪
♪ And that divinely free ♪ ♪ Come Holy Spirit and make known ♪
♪ The power of faith in me ♪ All right, does anybody have
a song that you'd like to sing out of any of the input before
we sing our last one? Well, how about we turn to 356
then? 356, rest for the weary souls. Does the gospel word proclaim,
rest for those who weary be? meant my soul but in thy claim
sure that promise speaks to thee all polluted is my I weary am I know? And the weary long for rest. Burdened with the load of sin. Harassed with tormenting doubt. Hourly conflicts from within. Hourly crosses from without All
my little strength is gone Sink I must without supply Sure upon
the earth there's none Can more weary be than I In the ark the
weary dove found a welcome resting place. Thus my spirit longs to
prove, rest in Christ the ark of grace. Tempest-tost I long
have been, Amen. We'll turn, if you will, this
morning over to the first verse we'll be looking at would be
Matthew chapter three. We'll be looking at several verses
as we go through, but Matthew chapter three will be where we
begin. Matthew chapter three. Matthew chapter three. bow and have a word of prayer. Our gracious Heavenly Father,
once again we meet by your providence in this place as your church
and we look to you this morning for all things that are needed.
We look to you, Father, for the movement of our mind and our
heart to attend to the things that you have to say. We look
for you in the movement of our mouth and lips and voice to proclaim
the things that you've given to be said. We look to you to
open up the word as the Holy Spirit teaches us. Father, we
pray that today that worship in our heart, in our mind, and
in our actions might be done according to thy word. We pray,
Father, that what we do is in spirit and in truth and is pleasing
to you. We pray, Lord, that Christ Jesus
be glorified and honored today in the preaching of God's Word.
We pray, Father, that the child of grace would be edified and
encouraged and uplifted and taught and brought closer to Christ
through the preaching of the Word today. Father, we truly
need you in all things. Without you, we can do nothing.
Without the work of the Spirit, without the work of Christ, without
you as God being who you are and what you have planned and
purposed, we would not even be here today. And so we look to
you for all things, acknowledge you as our King. We acknowledge
you as our priest and as our savior. We look to you as our
prophet to teach us, to show us things about yourself today. Father, we pray for all churches
that are meeting wherever they meet. Lord, we pray that they
might be given spiritual power today to accomplish that worship,
to learn of you, and that it might be pleasing to you. Lord,
we pray for others that you might bring to us, Lord, to join in
the service of Christ here at this church. And may it be a
time that we trust is your time, not things that we do through
entertainment or through coercion, Father, things that we do by
being faithful to your word, and as you build your church,
we are content in how and when you do that. And so, Father,
help us to continue to be faithful, and it's in Christ's name that
we pray, amen. Well, we have been looking at
the ordinances of the church. Now, if you hadn't forgotten,
We are in a series on the Lord's Church or the Ecclesia, a study
on the Lord's Ecclesia or the Lord's Church. We started that
way back when. I don't know exactly when. I'd
have to go back and look at the date where we first started,
but we started a long time ago. But we've been looking at a very
thorough study about the church, ecclesiology. We're studying
ecclesiology, what the Bible teaches about ecclesiology. but specifically the Lord's church
in how it functions, how it works, what it is, how it was set up,
how it is regulated, the work of Christ in it, the glory of
Christ in it, the help that it is to the child of grace. And
so we have been looking at a very thorough study in the church.
So if anybody's listening or watching this message, You're
actually jumping in right in the middle of a very long series
that goes way back. So if you're on Facebook, scroll,
scroll, scroll, scroll all the way back, and you'll see the
study of the church or the nature of the church part one, and that's
where we started. But we're in a subsection of
the study of the church on the ordinances of the church, and
we started with the ordinance of baptism. And so over the last
few weeks, we've been studying about the ordinance of water
baptism and what the Bible teaches about baptism. And I had mentioned
that at the end of that study that we were going to look at
some misconceptions about baptism, specifically how it relates to
Holy Spirit baptism and what some people now claim that there
is no water baptism that it's only Holy Spirit baptism now. There are some who claim that
water baptism isn't important. The only important thing is Spirit
baptism. That's the important thing, is
the Spirit baptism. And then there are some that
believe that Spirit baptism and water baptism coexist. They are
two separate things, and that they are still in effect today,
two baptisms, and they keep on a-truckin' throughout all of
history. Now, we're gonna look at what is Holy Spirit baptism,
or what is baptism in or with the Holy Spirit. And in doing
so, we are going to put to bed some errors concerning Holy Spirit
baptism, and we're gonna look and see what does the Bible say.
Now, this is another one of those areas, and just like many theological
issues, there is a lot of Theologians, a lot of confessions and creeds
in history that say a lot of things about Holy Spirit baptism. And a lot of those confessions
and creeds and theologians derive their understanding from preconceived
ideas that have been passed upon them by experience, by teaching,
surrounded teachings, by their theological Persuasions, okay,
that's not what we want, right? We don't want that. Now, if that
lines up with the word of God, that's wonderful. But what do
we want? We want to be taught what is
this according to God's word. And so we want to go to God's
word to find our information. We don't wanna run to John Gill,
we don't wanna run to C.H. Spurgeon, we don't wanna run
to you know, whatever commentator you want to, you know, Matthew
Henry or anybody else. We don't want to run to the 1689
confession, the 1644 confession. We don't want to run to the Westminster
confession by any stretch of the means. We don't want to run
to these confessions to find out, well, what does that mean?
Okay. We want to go to God's word and
see what does that mean? And then whenever we know what
God's word says, then we can look at those confessions and
those theologians and say, Does that man tell them the truth
about Jesus and about his stuff? And if it's not, then we have
to reject those things. And if it is, then we say, hey,
wonderful. That man's telling the truth about Jesus. The same
thing with my preaching. Those who are here today in this
church, those who are watching, listening, take what I say and
you compare that to the word of God and see whether or not
those things be true. And if they're not true, then
you disregard those things. If they are true and that's not
what you believe, then you need to repent of that wrong thinking
and begin to hold and stand for what is the Bible teaching of
those things. And so that's something that
we always ask. But what is Holy Spirit baptism? Now there is
a couple of prominent views of what the Holy Spirit baptism
is. There is the Pentecostal view, and there is the Protestant
view, okay? And I will put forth that the
Pentecostal view and the Protestant view are both in error in lining
up with what the scripture teaches about Holy Spirit baptism. So
there is Pentecostal view, the Protestant view, and there's
the proper view or the biblical view of the Holy Spirit baptism. And so I want to talk about those
today. The Pentecostal view believes
that the Holy Spirit baptism is this second work of grace
that happens to a Christian where the Holy Spirit comes upon them
and gives them this supernatural ability to do supernatural things,
okay? Whether that be to speak in tongues
or whether that be to prophesy the future or whether that be
to flop on the floor, whatever the
case might be, that this is a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit that
is baptizing them in himself and is causing them to have a
deeper spiritual relation with God that is a higher relation
that they can achieve through this work of the Holy Spirit.
And I'm not intentionally trying to misrepresent anybody's viewpoint.
So if there's Pentecostal out there that's saying you got that
wrong, then let me know that you got that wrong. But from
what I understand and the Pentecostal churches that I've attended in
my lifetime, the baptism of the Holy Spirit is something not
being saved, but something that happens after you're saved, that
is a supernatural work of the Spirit upon the Christian to
enable them to do these things that isn't normally done, okay? But the main one is the speaking
in tongues. Now, it's been my experience
in the Pentecostal churches that I've been into, and yes, I have
been in more than one. Matter of fact, I've been in
more than 10. Matter of fact, I've been in
more than 20 Pentecostal churches. And in those more than 20 Pentecostal
churches that I've been into, everyone that speaks in tongues
is speaking some ecstatic blabber that is not actual languages.
And so we're gonna see that what the Pentecostals teach is erroneous. But what about the Protestants?
What is the Protestant view of Holy Spirit baptism? Well, the
Protestant believes that the Holy Spirit baptism is the baptism
that the Holy Spirit baptizes the believer into Christ. Or that it's the baptism that
the Holy Spirit baptizes them in quickening or regeneration,
what they call regeneration, okay? That is erroneous. Holy Spirit baptism is not you
being saved. Holy Spirit baptism is not you
being quickened. Holy Spirit baptism is not you
being put into Christ. Those are erroneous. And so we
reject that. We reject the teaching that the
Holy Spirit baptism is a supernatural overwhelming of the person to
do supernatural deeds, okay? Like speaking in tongues and
healing and all those things, okay? We also reject the notion
that Holy Spirit baptism is a work of the Holy Spirit to quicken
the believer or to quicken the child of grace, the elect, or
that it is the work of the Holy Spirit to put you into Christ. And I believe the Bible is gonna
be very, very clear on these things. And if we see that the
Bible is clear, then we need to reject those other notions,
okay? No matter what tradition says,
and no matter what the greatest theologian says, okay? The greatest
theologians are just like you and me. They are finite creatures
who have a finite mind, who is subject to persuasions, and that
can be wrong. just as I can be, and I'm not
excluding myself. So weigh what I say according
to the scriptures, and let's not run to other things to try
to prove our point, but let's look at what the Word of God
says. Now, Holy Spirit baptism, what does the Bible say about
Holy Spirit baptism? Now, we've already read a few
of these verses in talking about John's baptism, but I want you
to read, I want to read it again so we can see what the Bible
says about Holy Spirit baptism. Number one, I want to say that
Holy Spirit baptism, if, I want to put aside the Pentecostal
view for a moment because we'll look at that when we get into
Acts and all like that, but the notion of the Protestant, that
Holy Spirit baptism is the moment that a person is quickened or
regenerated. Every child of grace before the
cross has been quickened, okay? So if those people before the
cross of Jesus Christ, before the day of Pentecost, if Holy
Spirit baptism happens to all them, then that Holy Spirit baptism
has to be according to how the Bible says it will take place.
and when it will take place. How and when is very important. And by whom. Okay? Now here's the reason why. And
I think Brother Hal Brunson, I want to give him a little credence
for this, although he got it from the Holy Spirit. The Holy
Spirit teaches these things. The Bible has it in here. It's
his observation though. One of the reasons why I put
off last week starting this is because I got Brother Brunson's
book that I was reading and he brought up a few points that
I had never considered before and I was searching to see whether
or not the things that he was saying was true according to
the scripture because they resonated with me and what seemed to be
the truth. But yet, you know, again, I don't want to run to
a book or somebody else to prove my point. I want to see, does
the Bible teach this? And I found that what he brought
forth in his book was accurate with the scriptures. If you remember,
whenever we were studying the baptism of John and baptism in
general, we found that there is a proper candidate, there
is a proper administrator, and there is a proper mode on how
you're to be baptized. The proper candidate was a believer,
a disciple of Jesus Christ, The proper administrator was the
local church, and the person appointed by the local church
to administer that baptism. And then the proper mode was
by immersion in water, right? So a person was baptized in water. So those three things were evident.
And John makes this, and you're gonna see this, because we wanna
read from every account in the Gospels where this is found,
and you will see John makes a connection between water baptism and the
baptism with the Holy Ghost. And that link there is that in
both water baptism and Holy Ghost baptism, there is the proper
administrator, there is the proper candidate, and there is the proper
administration of that or the proper mode in how that or what
they are to be baptized in, okay? And so you're gonna see that
in here, and if, whenever we go to baptism, we see, where's
the first occurrence? Where does the Holy Spirit first
teach us about the Holy Ghost baptism? Well, it's right here
in Matthew chapter three, okay? Unless you wanna take Joel's
prophecy about it back in the Old Testament, But what we're
seeing here as far as the details of Holy Ghost baptism is found
in Matthew chapter three, it's found in Mark, it's found in
Luke, it's found in Acts. And so we have to go by what
the Holy Spirit tells us about the details of Holy Ghost baptism. And then we need to equate everything
else in the scripture that talks about Holy Spirit baptism or
baptism with these two things. either what is John's baptism
or what is Holy Ghost baptism, okay? And it has to fit that
criteria. And in this criteria, we see
that in John's baptism, we find three things. Now look, if you
would, Matthew chapter three, looking in verse 11, it says, I indeed baptize you
with water. Now, what are the three things
that we see there? John, a man sent by God, we know that he
was sent by God to baptize. Okay, I indeed baptize who? You. Who's he talking to? Those
converts after he preached repentance. After he preached those converts
who came forth showing fruits of repentance, he claimed, I
baptize you. And what is the mode with water? So John is the baptizer, the
converts were those being baptized, and with water is the element
or the mode in which they were baptized,
immersed. It was a water immersion, right?
Okay. But look what he says, but in
contrast, He that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose
shoes I'm not worthy to bear. He, who's he? Jesus, shall baptize
you, the converts, with the Holy Ghost and with fire. So here
we see the same scenario. You have the baptizer, the baptized,
and with what they were baptized in or with, okay? So John was the water baptizer
of the converts. Jesus is the Holy Ghost baptizer
with the Holy Ghost, or the convert baptizer with
the Holy Ghost, okay? So you have John, you have converts,
and you have water. You have Jesus, you have the
converts, and you have water, right? No, Holy Ghost. See, it's not the other way around.
It's not the Holy Ghost is the baptizer of the converts into
Jesus. John baptized, what does it say
there? Look at the words. I indeed baptize you with water. You know that word with there?
is the Greek word en, E-N. And that word en can be translated
with or in, I-N. And in most translations, or
in most, excuse me, in most usages, it is the word I-N. Matter of
fact, the overarching use of that word is I-N. I baptize you
in water, unto repentance. But he that
cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy
to bear. He shall baptize you in or with the Holy Ghost and
with fire." So, we are baptized by Christ, not
the Holy Ghost. So any teaching that teaches
that it's the Holy Ghost who baptizes you is erroneous, because
the baptism is by Christ. And some will say, well, no,
no, we understand that, but there is another baptism that the Holy
Spirit does. There is the Holy Ghost baptism,
where the Holy Ghost does the baptizing, and that's when you're
quickened. Okay, we're gonna find out that that's not the
case either, okay? Whenever you are quickened, you
are quickened by the immediate work of the Holy Spirit, but
it is not the Holy Spirit who is doing the baptizing. And nowhere
in scripture can you find the Holy Spirit baptizing anybody. I will take that challenge from
anybody watching, anybody listening. Find one scripture in all Holy
Scripture that says the Holy Spirit has baptized anybody? No, not in 1 Corinthians 12,
not in Ephesians 4. It's not found there, okay? We're
gonna look at those verses, by the way. But look what it says
there in Matthew, okay? I indeed baptize you with water
under repentance, but he that cometh after me is mightier than
I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear. He shall baptize you
with the Holy Ghost and with fire. Now I'm gonna talk about
this right here in Matthew, but you're gonna see it in Mark and
Luke, and you're also gonna see it throughout all the passages
that we're gonna look at. But look at the word shall. He
shall baptize you. So Jesus is the one who is doing
the baptizing, not the Holy Spirit. And according to the passage
here at the baptism of John, John is saying he shall baptize,
future tense. So this baptism, with the Holy
Ghost and with fire has not happened. So anything that you would call
Holy Spirit baptism before is not biblical Holy Spirit baptism
because John here says this is something that is gonna happen
in the future. Jesus is gonna be doing the baptizing
and it's gonna be in the future. He shall baptize you with Holy
Ghost and with fire. So obviously this passage here
cannot be talking about being quickened or regenerated because
it's talking about a future event and there have been countless
numbers of people who have been quickened throughout all the
Old Testament. So this verse can't be talking
about quickening or regeneration, okay? Turn with me if you would
to Mark chapter one. Mark chapter one. Here again, Mark records the
same thing. John talking here. I indeed have past tense baptized
you with water, but he shall future tense baptize you with
the Holy Ghost. Okay, so again, who is the administrator
of Holy Ghost baptism? It's not the Holy Ghost, it's
Jesus. And who is the one who is receiving
the baptism? The you, right? Again, it's that
gathered congregation of believers that John had prepared for Jesus. Now, if you don't know what I'm
talking about, go back and listen to not only the nature of the
church, but also go back and listen to the work of John the
Baptist whenever we start our study on baptism. So it is the
gathered believers as a collective that he says is gonna be baptized
with the Holy Ghost. You see, let me pause here for
just a minute. For those who have been following
him that's here and watching, you remember back whenever we
talked about the Great Commission. And I told you that a lot of
people believe it was just the 12 disciples that was there,
but we've seen that the preceding verses before the Great Commission
showed that the women were there, that the brethren were there,
that the disciples were there, and that the apostles were there,
right? Okay? We've seen that the gathered
church was there. And then in Acts, we've seen
that those who had been on the mountain where Christ had given
this commission, ascended to the Father, they left directly
from that place and went to the upper room who were told in Acts
that the names and numbers of those in that upper room were
120. Okay, so there was more than
12. There was 120 up on that mountain
who heard Jesus give the commission. That commission was given to
the church in its gathered institutional form, okay? It was the church
that was given the commission. Now, this corroborates exactly
what we are gonna say. The baptism of the Holy Ghost
is to a collective people in that institutional form and what
it represents, what it is, okay? That's why we believe. Listen,
you just can't come to this and say, explain to me in the local
church, why has this study been so long? Why has it been so long? Because it's not just a turn
to one page to say, well, there it is. The church is a local,
visible assembly of God, thus saith the Lord, okay? It's a
study of all the scriptures. And we see there is pictures
and symbols in the Old Testament, but yet the New Testament, we
see that the New Testament church takes on something different
than what's in the Old Testament in its pictorial form, but yet
it still works the same. It's the institution that God
has chosen to be the place where his service and gospel and ordinances
is carried out and conducted. They are the ones that have the
strict authority to carry it out, just as in the Old Testament,
the priesthood had the strict authority within national Israel
to conduct those things, okay? And so we see here that it is
a collective people who is gonna be baptized with the Holy Ghost,
not an individual. He said, you, speaking to the
congregation of people there, you, He shall baptize you with
the Holy Ghost. So again, we find it's Christ
who is the one who's doing the baptizing. It is the collective
group who is the one who is gonna be baptized, and they are gonna
be baptized with or in the Holy Spirit. So Holy Spirit's not
doing any work there. The Holy Spirit is passive in
this, in the fact that Jesus Do you ever, let me ask you,
has any of you ever said, whenever talking about your water baptism,
have you ever said, man, that water baptized me? Have you ever
talked about your baptism like that? And said, I was baptized
by the water, you know, 20 years ago. No, you don't say that,
do you? Whenever I talk about my baptism,
you know what I say? I say Brother Howard baptized me in water. Who was the one who baptized
me? Brother Howard. Who was the one getting baptized?
Me. And what did he baptize me? Water. The water didn't do anything.
The water wasn't active in baptizing me. It was not the administrator
of baptism, it was the one in whom the administration of baptism
was used. The Holy Spirit is the one who
is being used, Jesus is the one using it, and it is the collective
who is being baptized by that, okay? And I hope this isn't getting
murky for anybody, but that's what we see here. But notice
again, the word shall is future tense. So Mark here again is
pointing to the fact that this activity of Holy Ghost baptism
is something that has not yet happened, but is happening in
the future to this particular collective of people that John
is talking to. Look with me if you would at
Luke. Luke chapter three, verse 16. Those that are watching and listening,
I pray that you hang on. Don't let the confusion or the
murkiness of how I deliver these sermons bother you any, because
I hope that you'll see this, that we've been misled by a lot
of theologians. But hang with me here, because
you're gonna see this here in just a few minutes, to be true.
Luke chapter three, look with me if you would, down to verse
16. The Bible says in the mouth of two
or three witnesses, a thing is established, right? We've seen
two witnesses already to what we're talking about, but let's
look at the third one. Luke chapter three, verse 16.
John answered saying unto them all, I indeed baptize you with water. but one mightier than I cometh,
the legend of whose shoes I'm not worthy to unloose, he, the
one coming that is mightier than John, shall baptize, future tense,
you, the collective that he was talking to, with the Holy Ghost
and with fire. So here's a third witness in
scripture bearing out the fact that it is Jesus who does the
baptizing, not the Holy Spirit. It's Jesus who does the baptizing.
It's not individuals, but a collective of people who will be baptized. And it is with the Holy Spirit
or the Holy Ghost and fire. Notice it says Holy Ghost and
fire. Future tense, right? Let's look, if you would, at
Acts chapter one. Acts chapter one. Got Matthew, got Mark. What about Luke? What does Luke
say? He said it in one spot. Does
he say it again? Well, he records what Jesus says.
Look at Acts chapter one. Starting in verse one, Acts chapter
one, verse one. The former treaties have I made,
O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began, both to do and teach,
until the day in which he was taken up. After that, he, through
the Holy Ghost, had given commandments under the apostles whom he had
chosen, to whom he showed himself alive after his passion, by many
infallible proofs, being seen of them 40 days, and speaking
of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. And being assembled
together with them, commanded them that they should not depart
from Jerusalem, but, here it is, wait for the promise of the
Father, which saith he, ye have heard of, me. Now, keep your finger there. I'm going to read to you something
back in Luke chapter 24. Chapter 24 and in verse Verse 49, okay. Luke 23, verse 49, or 24. I can't keep my mind straight
here. Luke 24, 49, I'm sorry. 49. Jesus says this, and ye are witnesses
of these things, and behold, I send the promise of my Father
upon you, but tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem until ye be
endued with power from on high. Okay, so here at Jesus, the account
that Luke give us of Jesus' ascension and what he said to these people,
he said for them that he is gonna send forth the promise of my
father upon you. But tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem
until ye be endued with power from on high. Okay, so this baptism of the
Holy Spirit is a being endued with power from on high. That's one of the things that's
gonna happen and why the Holy Spirit is being given. Okay,
but notice it's called the promise of my Father. It's gonna take
place in Jerusalem and they are to tarry ye in the city, so that
means that it's gonna happen pretty quick, right? Now, John
has said beforehand, three years earlier, it shall happen, so
it's in the future. Jesus now is saying that it's
not gonna happen very far away. Now, back into Acts, this is
what he said. He said, but wait for the promise
of the Father, which ye have heard of me, okay? So Jesus here
is saying, remember, I've told you about these things. For John truly baptized with
water, but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost. What's Jesus
doing there? He said, wait a minute, you've
heard about the promise of the Father from me already. But then
he says, it's what John said. Did you catch that? He said, wait
for the promise of the Father, which ye have heard of me. So John taught about the promise
of the Father that Jesus was gonna be involved in, right?
That's why he goes into verse five and says, John truly baptized
with water, but ye shall be, future tense, baptized with the
Holy Ghost not many days hence. So again, at Jesus's ascension,
Holy Spirit baptism has not yet occurred. If Holy Spirit baptism
is the Protestant view of quickening or putting one into Christ, then
that means every one of those 120 believers in the congregation
of that first church have not been quickened and have not been
unionized with Christ. Every child of grace in the Old
Testament has not been quickened. Because right here, Jesus says,
this is something that's about to happen not many days hence.
And he's talking about what John was talking about. When John
said, there's one coming that whose shoelaces I can't tie,
he's gonna baptize you with Holy Ghost and fire, John was talking
about the promise of the Father. Jesus made reference to the promise
of the Father at his ascension, and he tied that back to what
John said. Now, side note, notice what Jesus
says about John's baptism. He said John truly baptized with
water, or in water, okay? John's baptism was legit, folks.
If anybody's gonna say that John's baptism wasn't legit, then they
have a problem with Jesus, because Jesus right here said John truly
baptized in water or with water. Okay? John didn't baptize with
the Holy Spirit. John baptized with water. John's
baptism wasn't just an intermediate thing. John truly baptized. His baptism is true baptism.
That's why Jesus went to him 60 miles away to be baptized. That's why Jesus said, thus it
behooves us to do this because it is gonna bring forth all righteousness. Okay, so John's baptism is legit,
but that's, you know, we've already talked about that. But what do
we see here? Jesus is saying this Holy Ghost baptism is something
that's gonna happen in a few days. So it hasn't happened yet,
right? So what's the evidence that the
Bible has given us so far? Jesus is gonna be the baptizer,
that congregation of people is gonna be the ones baptized, and
they are gonna be baptized with the Holy Ghost and fire. That's the Holy Ghost baptism
that we're looking for, right? We're looking to see what is
this promise of a Holy Ghost baptism, because this is the
promise of the Father. There are people all the time
talking about regeneration being, oh, man, that's God's promise,
you know, of, you know, His quickening is the promise that He gives
us of the baptism of the Holy Spirit. That's not true. We've got all the pieces in place
here. Who's the baptizer? Who's being
baptized? And with what are they being
baptized? And when? It's not past, it's not right
now, but it is future. And at this point, three and
a half years after it was first talked about, Jesus said, not
many days hence. When the therefore were come
together, they asked him saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time
restore again the kingdom of Israel? So this is where they
still was not completely understanding of what all is going on. But what does he say? He said
to them, it is not for you to know the times and the seasons, which
the Father hath put in his own power, but ye, there it is again,
the collective, not individual, collective. But ye shall receive
power. Isn't that what Jesus said back
in Luke? You will be endued with power.
But ye shall receive power. After that, the Holy Ghost is
come upon you. and ye shall be witnesses unto
me, both in Jerusalem and all Judea and Samaria and into the
other most parts of the world. The undoing of power, the promise
of the Father, the baptism with the Holy Ghost, the purpose of
that is to give the church the power to spread the gospel to
all the world, not just the nation of Israel. Up until this point,
the gospel, the ordinances, the oracles of God, and the ordinances
of God have been confined to the nation of Israel, who have
rejected her Messiah, and Christ has already preached and told
to her, your house will be left desolate unto you. It's gonna
be destroyed. This whole religious system will
be torn down. This whole entire priesthood
is gonna be torn down. This whole entire nation is going
to be torn down. This city is going to be torn
down. Everything is going to be completely torn down. But there's going to be something
that I want to put in its place. The New Testament church. That's
my new tabernacle. That's my new temple. That's
my new place of service. That's my new dwelling place. And so Jesus made reference all
throughout his ministry that there's a time coming that you're
not gonna worship up in that temple. Why? Because that temple
and all that it represents is gonna be torn down. But there
is something that's coming that is not made with hands. And it's
a spiritual temple. That spiritual temple is a congregation
of baptized believers coming together, forming a body, forming
a church, Okay, they form that body of
Christ. They form that church. They form this very place where
Christ will be present. And he is in institutional way,
in an institutional way, at the very beginning, gonna endue that
institution with power. And I'm gonna show you, it's
gonna be several Sundays from now, but I'm gonna also show
you I can prove that in the Old Testament. Those who wanna say
that the church is not the replacement, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
blah, all this junk back and forth, listen, the church is
the replacement of Old Testament Israel, of Old
Testament Tabernacle. It is the replacement. It is
what God has determined to be the place of the gospel, and
of the ordinances. And I can prove that, I can prove
that by the Old Testament, and we'll do that in the weeks to
come. But look what he says here. Ye shall receive power, that's
what he said in the Luke account as well, the promise of the Father,
and he talked about it up here, wait for the promise of the Father,
it's gonna happen not many days hence, You shall receive power
after the Holy Ghost has come up on you. The Holy Ghost is
gonna come up on you. But see, the Holy Ghost isn't
the baptizer, Jesus is. The Holy Ghost is the one that
Jesus uses to come upon them with. We're gonna see this, right? But wait for the promise of the
Father, and it's gonna happen not many days hence. So this
passage, demands that baptism did not happen prior to Acts
chapter 1. It didn't happen until after
that. So, for the Pentecostal, there
was no preconditions for this Holy Spirit baptism to take place.
See, for the Pentecostal, there has to be some preconditions
for them to receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit. But here
we see that there was no conditions. All they was told to do is to
stay in Jerusalem and wait. They didn't have to pray for
it. They didn't have to beg for it.
They didn't have to sing worship songs for it. All they had to
do is they had to go and tarry and wait because it was gonna
be sent to them. There was gonna be an administrator
who was gonna come with the agent in which they would be baptized
with and he would be doing the action, not them. So there wasn't any kind of promise
to fulfill. Now, look with me at Acts chapter
two. Acts chapter two. Now again,
remember, the names and number of these people who were in one
place was 120, right? It was that church. It was the
first church. Look at chapter two, verse one.
And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all
with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound
from heaven as of a rushing, mighty wind, and it filled all
the house where they were sitting. Now, What does the Bible in John
chapter three liken the Holy Spirit to? You remember whenever
Jesus was talking about being born again and he was talking
about the Holy Spirit? Okay. What was a reference that Jesus
used about the Holy Spirit and likened him to in the physical
realm? What? Fire. There's another reference also
in there that he used. The wind blows where it listeth. Talking about the Holy Spirit,
right? So fire and water are both used
to speak of the Holy Spirit. Here we see, and suddenly there
came a sound from heaven. Where did Jesus go when he ascended? He went back to heaven to be
at the right hand of God. to sit upon the throne of God, until all his enemies be made
his footstool. They were in one place, in one
accord, suddenly there came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing
mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.
So you could probably say they were immersed in this wind, right?
Would that not be what baptism is? They were baptized in this
wind. And there appeared unto them
cloven tongues like as of fire, and it set upon each of them. So the whole collective received
this, right? Everyone in there. The rushing mighty wind came
and filled the whole entire house where they were staying, So they
were immersed in the Holy Spirit, tongues of fire set upon every
one of them, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and
began to speak with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. So the Spirit came, and when
the Spirit came, the Spirit gave them utterances of other tongues. You notice that right there,
right? Now let me make some pointers here. Of other tongues, plural. Other tongues, plural. A static speech doesn't have
other static speech. Static speeches are static speeches.
If I sit here and go, shambala, shambala, shambala, shambala,
shambala, shambala, shambala, shambala, shambala. Okay, that's
not an actual language. Okay, that's not an actual language. So there is no determination
between that and me going... It's just gibberish. It isn't
an actual language. You can't just determine gibberish
from gibberish. Ecstatic from ecstatic. It's
not languages. It's just babble. If he was talking
about babble, it would be singular because there's only one type
of ecstatic speech of babble. He would say, and they began
to speak in other tongue, in another tongue. But it didn't
say that. He began to speak with other
tongues, plural, but it's only as the Spirit gave them utterance.
So that tells me that what was happening here with this speaking
in other tongues isn't something that you can teach somebody.
It isn't something that you can push on anybody. It isn't something
that you can work up in yourself I've heard many a Pentecostal
say, I just need to get into the Spirit. You've got to have
enough faith. You've got to step out in faith.
You've got to let go of yourself. And don't say you don't know
what you're talking about. There's an Assembly of God church
that I had attended up in Colorado that give out handouts to children
to teach them how to talk in tongues. They had classes about
how to talk in tongues. said to everybody, you just gotta
let go. Immerse yourself in the worship,
immerse yourself in the experience, immerse yourself in the Holy
Spirit. So there, you're the baptizer with the Holy Spirit. But what does it say here? This
phenomenon, this promise of the Father that Jesus was talking
about and John was talking about, that hadn't happened in the past,
but was fixing to happen, and now is happening. It says here
that they spoke with other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance,
and they were dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men, out of every
nation under heaven. What does the Bible say? Ye shall
receive power after the Holy Ghost has come upon you, and
ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem and Judea and
Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth. What did Jesus
say? Go into all the world and preach
the gospel. You shall be endued with power
from on high, and you're going to be a witness to every nation
group. To every person, not just the
nation Israel, but to every nation. And what is the first thing that
we see? The Holy Spirit comes down and gives them power. by
the immersion of Jesus Christ, gives them power to speak the
other languages of other people. And what happens? Those men out
of all those nations, every nation under heaven, heard them speak
in their tongue. Look at it, verse six. And when
this was noise abroad, the multitude came together and was confounded
because that every man, every man, heard them, the ones in
the upper room, the 120, where the Holy Spirit came down on
the 120 and filled the room. And then tons of fire lit up
on every head, not just one or two, but on every head. And that
that Holy Spirit immersed that whole entire room and filled
those people and gave them utterances of other languages. And what does it say here? Because that every man heard
them, those people, speak in his, them people, the men from
all the nations, own language. Tongues is a speaking of a known
tongue by someone who does not know that tongue. That's the
biblical gift of tongues. plural. Why? Because there's
Hebrew, because there's Greek, because there's Spanish, because
there's Chinese, because there is whatever tribe you want to go
to. God give these people the ability to message the gospel
of Jesus Christ to anybody, Jew or Gentile. And they had the
power to do that. But we're going to find out that
this particular instance had more than just the ability to
tell the Gentiles and the other nations the gospel, but it was
also a warning and a sign to the Jews, because it was prophesied
back in the Old Testament. We'll look at that later. Look,
it said, now they were all amazed and marveled, saying one to another,
Behold, are not all these which speak Galileans? And how hear
we every man in our own tongue? You notice how it says tongue
in singular? It didn't say in our own tongues.
He said, how we every man in our own tongue. He's talking
about each individual from each nation that was represented there
was hearing him. So you may be a Galilean, you
may be a, you know, a Sicilian, you may be a, you know, wherever
you was from, they heard them speak in that language. There
is multiple languages, thus the Holy Spirit used the word other
tongues, plural, but here whenever this guy says, hey, listen, I've
heard this guy in my own tongue. Singular, why? Because English
is English, right? Spanish is Spanish, German is
German, Russian is Russian. Parthians, Medes, Elamites, and
the dwellers of Mesopotamia, and in Judea, in Cappadocia,
and in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the
parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and
proselytes, Creeps and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our
tongues, the wonderful works of God. What are they? Okay, a lot to unpack right there. Notice with me. Number one, tongues
is plural because there are several different kinds of tongues, right?
They're known languages. And that's what they're speaking,
that's biblical tongues. Anything else than that is unbiblical.
If you're out there, shamba bamba shamba, that's not biblical tongues. What you're doing is a farce.
I don't care how serious you think you're being, it's a farce.
Get away from that. If it's something that you can't
control, start praying to God that you might be delivered from
some demon, okay? If you're even a child of grace
to begin with. A child of grace can't be possessed by a demon.
Start praying because your mind has been taken over by something
controlling you, doing something that is not biblical. The static
speech is not biblical. I don't care what the TV preachers
tell you, not true. But notice also in verse 11,
we do hear them, who's the them? The 120, who the Holy Ghost baptized or excuse me, who Jesus baptized
in the Holy Ghost. Speak in our tongues, what do
they speak though? What was the tongues given for? To convey the wonderful works
of God. Is that what Jesus said, you
shall receive power after the Holy Ghost has come upon me and
you shall be witnesses unto me? The baptism with the Holy Ghost
was given upon that local church to empower and do with power
that institution as God's new place of residence and service
to boldly and to correctly and to widespreadly, if you allow
that word, preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. God is no longer
confining things to Israel He has put down Israel. He has divorced
Israel, rejected Israel. He has made that place desolate. And he has joined together Jew
and Gentile and bring them together into one. The wall of partition,
the wall of separation has been pulled down. The two has now
became one person. Okay. It is not the people of
the flesh, but the people of the spirit. Look at verse 12. And they were
all amazed and were in doubt, saying one to another, what meanest,
what does this mean? What does all this mean? Others
mocked and said, these men are full of new wine, saying they're
drunk. But Peter, standing up with the 11, lifted up his voice
and said unto them, ye men of Judea and all ye that dwell at
Jerusalem, be this known unto you and hearken to my words.
For these are not drunken, as ye suppose, seeing as but the
third hour of the day. But, here it is, this is that
which was spoken by the prophet Joel. So now, we're beginning
to see, what is the baptism with the Holy Spirit? It was that
very thing that was prophesied by the prophet Joel. which said,
well, preacher, there's a lot of people that say that that
prophecy by the prophet of Joel is talking about being quickened,
when people are quickened. And whenever they're quickened,
they're gonna be prophesying. Well, brother, Peter here is
putting it into context for you. Peter, under the leadership of
the Holy Spirit, is telling you what Joel meant. Quit listening
to the theologian tell you, especially the dispensational theologians. Quit listening to the theologians
tell you what Joel means. And listen to what the Holy Spirit
tells you Joel means. Because Peter here says, what
you just saw with that mighty rushing wind filling this place
of 120 believers and that fire lighting upon their head, And
those utterances of known languages by people who did not know those
languages is what Joel was talking about. So that means that what Joel
was talking about had not happened before Pentecost. And what Peter
says is happening is something that no one else has ever experienced
before, but had just happened to a group of people, not everybody,
but to that group of people. And as we're gonna find out,
that took place no more from there on forward, except by three
more accounts. And those three were among Gentiles. And when that happened, what
happened there was attributed to what was showing that they
were part of what happened at the beginning. Now, we'll get
to there eventually, but I want you to see this. that Peter is
the one who is saying that this mighty rushing wind is the baptism
of the Holy Spirit. It's what Joel was talking about.
It's what Jesus was saying was the promise of the Father. It's
what John said was gonna take place when Jesus would baptize
us with fire and with the Holy Ghost. That's what it is. So that is our criteria. Is there
Holy Spirit baptism today? Well, if there is, it has to
fit that criteria. Jesus has to do it, it has to
be with the Holy Spirit, and it has to be a congregation of
people. And it has to be with mighty rushing wind and a tongue
of fire upon the head. Has that happened anywhere else
in the course of history? Whenever you were born again,
did that happen to you? Did God fill the room that you
were in with a mighty rushing wind and put a cloven tongue
of fire above your head? I've not ever seen that happen
ever in my whole entire lifetime. Guess what? My mom and dad have
never told me about anybody they've ever met. My grandparents has
never told me that they had ever seen that ever in the history
of their life as it ever happened to any Christian. I've not read
that in any history books that has to do with religious things
at all, ever. The only place that I've ever
heard that ever happening that is at Pentecost. And those tied
to Pentecost. Never again. So how can we say
that the Holy Spirit baptism is something that continues?
How can we say it was something that happened in the Old Testament?
How can we say it's something that the Holy Spirit does when
the Holy Spirit isn't the one who does the baptizing? So the
Protestant and the Pentecostal view is erroneous, and we've
seen that here just by reading the word of God. Look at verse
17. Here he talks about what was spoken by the prophet Joel.
And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will
pour out my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters
shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your
old men shall dream dreams." Okay, I'm gonna pour out my spirit
upon all flesh. Okay, not just Israelites, but
I'm gonna pour out my spirit upon all flesh. And on my servants
and on my handmaids, I will pour out in those days of my spirit,
and they shall prophesy. And I will show wonders in heaven
above and signs in the earth beneath, blood and fire and vapors
of smoke. The sun shall be turned into
darkness and the moon into blood before the great notable day
of the Lord come. And it shall come to pass that
whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved."
This is the prophet Joel, what he's talking about. He's not
talking about some future event, brethren. See, a lot of people
wanna talk about the signs and wonders and the earth, and the
earth beneath, the blood and fire and vapor and smoke, the
sun being turned into darkness, the moon into blood, talking
about the last day when Christ comes again. But it's not talking
about that. It's talking about that day.
Peter said this, what you just saw is what Joel was talking
about. So how can we go to Joel and
say, Joel is talking about some future event that's gonna take
place whenever Jesus comes at the second time? That's not what
he said. He said right here, what Joel
prophesied is what you just seen. You said, well, wait a minute.
Well, where's the moon turning into blood? Where's the darkness,
the sun shall be turned into darkness and all that stuff. Well, didn't it turn dark whenever
Jesus was crucified? That took place before this great
day. The moon turned into blood. What happens whenever the clouds
and everything starts covering over the moon? Have you ever
seen that on a day whenever, or even at night? Have you ever
seen at night whenever the clouds start covering over the moon?
The moon changes colors, don't it? But it says that the sun shall
be turned into darkness and the moon into blood. When else have
we seen that phenomenon? Have you ever seen an eclipse? Doesn't that look like that whenever
there's an eclipse? The sun turns dark. The moon, as all these
things are taking place, seems to have a darkening effect. But here it says, before the
great and notable day of the Lord. Is that talking about the very end
day when Christ comes again? Well, I don't think so. And it shall come to pass that
whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. What is this talking about? What
is the purpose for all these signs? All this right here, Joel
was giving us apocryphal speak. He was talking about things that
always, if you go into the Old Testament and look, you'll see
coming judgment is always talked about by the darkening of the
sun, the moon turning to blood. All these things are apocryphal
writing that says judgment is near, judgment's
coming. And what did Jesus say? Your
house is going to be left to you desolate. And these are going to be the
signs that that day is coming. There's going to be people that
are going to speak in other languages. You're going to hear them speak
in other languages. Well, that's what these Jews heard that testified
to them. They should have thought immediately
whenever they heard that they should have said, Oh, my goodness.
The Old Testament teaches me that that's the coming judgment.
Whenever they began to see all these things take place, of these
sons and daughters prophesying about the great works of God
in other languages that they had never learned, that should
have told them, there's coming judgment. Judgment is coming. But instead, they hardened their
hearts and they continued to be in disbelief, right? They just
continued in disbelief. They didn't believe. And what
happened eventually, after the course of a few years? Jerusalem was completely destroyed.
The temple was completely destroyed. Everything was put to waste.
The priesthood was put to waste. The pharisaical order, put to
waste. Sadducees, put to waste. Everything was tore down and
put, but guess what stood? The gates of hell didn't prevail
against the church. The church continued. Matter of fact, the
church continued to multiply. The church continued to become
strong in faith and in practice and begin to reach across the
whole entire world. Until that time, guess what?
The Jewish thing was very confined to that little bit of area. Little
proselytes here and there, but confined to that area. But the
gospel was now was reaching out to the very fact that they were
saying they turned the world upside down to the very fact
that they said, if nobody stops this, then everybody's going
to believe on Jesus. I mean, they were seeing the power
of the gospel like they had never seen the power of their law system
ever. Go and wait until you are endued
with power. And you will, once you're endued
with power, will be my witnesses in every nation. Who's he talking
to? He's talking to the church as
an institution, his kind of church. If you're a New Testament church,
if you are a church that is like the church that Jesus started,
that's who you are. And you have a, that's why I
kept saying all through our study about the ecclesia, Listen, there
is something special about being part of a New Testament congregation. God has promised a presence in
that congregation and an ability and work to preach and to hold
the gospel like he has not done out there in individual lives. In here, in the corporate arena
where we come together as the body of Christ, God has given
gifts for men to teach and to preach and to uphold God's word,
to give them understanding of God's word, to convey that to
the brethren. He's given the Holy Spirit to
those brethren to understand that in their heart, but yet
the coming together in the congregation somehow by God's divine work
strengthens and encourages and is used to hold to, because the
Bible says that the church is the pillar and the ground of
truth, to hold the truth from generation to generation, to
propagate the truth from generation to generation. And these people,
they stay together, they hold together, they work together.
They are able to love each other together. They are able to study
with each other together. They're able to disagree together
because of the power of the Holy Spirit that has been given to
them. They've been endued with power to be this. just as we've
seen God endued them with power in the Old Testament, and we're
gonna see that eventually. So is the Holy Spirit baptism
some wild, ecstatic speech? No. Is the baptism of the Holy Spirit
being born again? No. Is there a baptism other than
water baptism that continues on? No. There's only one baptism that
is to be continual, and that is water baptism. Holy Spirit
baptism is not the one baptism that the scripture talks about. So I ask, if you believe that
baptism is this static speech, is this work of Pentecostalism, Or if
you believe that Holy Spirit baptism is being quickened, or
born again, or being put into Christ, then where's your scripture
for that? Because where we see the teaching
of the Holy Spirit baptism, it is always in connection with
the fact that Jesus was the baptizer, the church in its local congregational
capacity was the ones being baptized with the Holy Spirit. Not the
other way around. The Holy Spirit wasn't baptizing
those people into Christ. Christ was baptizing those people
into the Holy Spirit so that they might be endued with power
to be witnesses for Him. That's where our service comes
in. We're the service of Christ. We're the witnesses for Christ.
We are His angels. We are His messengers. We are
His spokespeople. We do that as a congregation. Tell me where you can find that
anywhere else. How does those two baptisms by those two erroneous
systems find its place in Scripture? It can't. It can't and it doesn't. Nowhere have you seen anybody
that has had that Pentecostal experience ever happen again. Nowhere do we see the Bible teaches
that the Holy Spirit baptizes one person at all. And if you think that something
says that, compare that with the rest of Scripture, and compare
that with the understanding of Scripture, because if you say
that, then that means the Old Testament people were not born
again. Because the baptism with the Holy Ghost was something
that had not happened in the Old Testament. Were they born
again and dwelt by the Holy Spirit? Absolutely they were. See, I
used to believe, because I used to be a dispensationalist. I
used to be a premillennial dispensationalist. I used to believe that the Old
Testament Christians were saved in a different way than the New
Testament Christians. The Old Testament Christians didn't have
the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, that the Holy Spirit just came
upon them for certain acts of service and then went away. But
they weren't indwelled. Nobody was indwelled until the
day of Pentecost. And then that's when the church
began, is at the day of Pentecost. But brethren, I found those,
if I compared that with the Word of God, to be false and lies. The children of God, the Bible
says, if they have not the Spirit of God, they are none of His. That every child of grace from
Adam to the very end will be born again, quickened of God. And that everyone that is born
of God has the Spirit of God. And so it can't be the Holy Ghost
baptism can't be that because that was happening in the Old
Testament. And God tells us that this Holy Ghost baptism had not
happened in the Old Testament, that it was something that was
about to happen. And then whenever it did happen,
Peter said, this is what Joel talked about. And so now Peter
says, this is describing the judgment that was about to come
on God's people. National Israel. And so, We'll end right there,
I have a lot more to say about this stuff in the days to come. But for those who are watching
or listening, we will not be having services here next Sunday
or the Sunday after that. So there will not be any broadcast.
So if you have any other person that you wanna take a listen
to, then you can take a listen to them. But we will not have
any broadcast or any services here. for the next two Sundays. I'm gonna be gone, and so I won't
be able to bring any messages here. But we will resume with
this talk on baptism with the Holy Ghost whenever I come back,
which will be on the 15th of March, okay? All right, if anybody
has any questions, comments, observations, corrections, reviews,
reproofs, For those who are listening and watching, put them down below
in the comments and I will try to answer those by God's word
the best I can. All right, I hope this has been eye-opening
for some and I hope it's been comforting to others. All right,
let's bow and ask the Lord to bless this food that we're about
to eat.