The Baptism and Gifts of the Spirit:  A Temporary Cessationist Proposal (Part 1)

The Holy Spirit’s role in the life of the believer has been a subject of much controversy particularly since the onset of Pentecostalism in the early 20^th Century.  This movement, spring-boarding from the Azusa Street Revival in Los Angeles, has since spread throughout the entire world, giving birth to the Assemblies of God, the Churches of God, and several nondenominational mega churches, such as Hillsong and Bethel.

Veering from the historic two-state system, Pentecostals advocate a three-state system.  In their system there are unsaved people, saved people, and a new class of people who are saved and subsequently baptized in the Spirit.  Those who are baptized in the Spirit have a special relationship and sensitivity to the Holy Spirit that the other saved people do not have.  They are allegedly more empowered for the mission of Jesus Christ.

Of course, such a conception stirs up controversy in the church.  Some non-Pentecostals charge Pentecostals with elitism and counterfeit spiritual experiences, while some Pentecostals charge non-Pentecostals with dead, carnal religion. The point of this article is to discuss the issues at hand, dig into the Biblical storyline of the Holy Spirit, and arrive at a practical, middle ground view.

My personal story

This debate is near and dear to me because I grew up under the three-state Pentecostal system, where I was taught to seek a baptism in the Holy Spirit subsequent to salvation, with tongues and prophecy being normal parts of church life. In my teens, my family moved to a more cautious nondenominational church, but after I married, my wife and I joined a Pentecostal church steeped in Word of Faith theology. I led a discipleship ministry there and even wrote a book defending Word of Faith teaching. Years later, I left my career for full-time ministry at another independent Word of Faith church, this one also influenced by aberrant Latter Rain teachings.

After a few years in that environment, my wife and I became convinced that much of what we were experiencing bore little resemblance to the genuine supernatural activity described in Acts. We eventually left and became members of a non-Pentecostal evangelical church. My journey has therefore taken me from Pentecostalism, through an extreme charismatic environment, to a more cautious reformed position—and it is from that perspective that I approach this debate.

Various Positions

Below I will summarize five predominant positions on the Baptism in the Spirit (B.I.S.), in the approximate order of their emergence:  Historic Protestant, Pentecostal, Charismatic, Third Wave, and Open but Cautious.

Position	B.I.S. in Acts	B.I.S. Today	Gifts attending the B.I.S.	Gifts following the B.I.S.	Adherents
Historic Protestant	Inaugurated the church age	During conversion	Not necessarily	Gifts largely ceased	John McArthur, R.C. Sproul
Pentecostal (First Wave)	Pattern for the church age	After conversion	Yes – Tongues	Gifts characterize church life *	Assemblies of God, Church of God
Charismatic (Second Wave)	Pattern for the church age	After conversion	Not necessarily	Gifts characterize church life *	Chuck Smith, Calvary Chapel
Neocharismatic (Third Wave)	Inaugurated the church age	During conversion	Not necessarily	Gifts characterize church life *	Wayne Grudem, John Piper, John Wimber, The Vineyard
Open but Cautious	Inaugurated the church age	During conversion	Not necessarily	Genuine gifts are rare **	Robert Saucy, Craig Keener[i], D.A. Carson, Evangelical Free Church

* They vary in degree and are often less remarkable than those in Acts. Tongues are typically unintelligible syllables, and prophecies are usually spontaneous, generic encouragements rather than miraculous predictions.

* * The miraculous gifts are deemed genuine only if they are demonstrably miraculous, like those in the Book of Acts. This includes tongues as real languages and prophecies as accurate predictions directly from visual or audible communication from God. Sensational and naturalistic forms are considered counterfeits.

The Pentecostal movement brought an abrupt shift away from the historical theology of the Spirit, particularly on its emphasis on a post-conversion baptism in the Spirit and accompanying gifts. Yet, over time, its influence has rippled far beyond Pentecostalism itself.  Its over-reaction to stoic ecclesiastical worship has helped steer much of evangelicalism toward an openness to the Spiritual gifts (in varying degrees), as well more expressive forms of worship—hand raising, spontaneity, and more emotional engagement. But how does this contemporary spectrum compare with the Biblical pattern?

The Biblical Story-line of the Baptism in the Spirit

We now turn to the Bible itself to trace the developing Biblical theology of the Baptism in the Spirit. John the Baptist is the first person to mention the baptism in the Spirit.

John’s prediction

Mt 3:11 “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 12 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.”

Notice John contrasts Jesus’ Spirit baptism with his water baptism.  He envisages the forthcoming Spirit baptism as an eschatological event that occurs in parallel with the judgement event (v12). In doing so, he portrays a two-state system consisting of:  Believers baptized in Holy Spirit [wheat] vs Unbelievers burned with unquenchable fire [chaff]. Craig Keener notes, “Because John the Baptist contrasts baptism in the Holy Spirit with hell-fire, he apparently applies it to all true believers.”[ii] This initial observation presents a challenge to the 3-state system proposed by Pentecostals.

Moving on, we see Jesus referring to this same forthcoming Spirit baptism:

 Acts 1:4 And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me; 5 for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

Notice He ties the Spirit baptism, or the “promise of the Father”, to the “power from on high” which is a prerequisite to successfully preaching the Gospel.  The disciples were not to begin their mission without it (Lk 24:49, Acts 1:8).  At the time Jesus spoke these words, the Spirit had not yet come to the earth in this universally empowering sense.  John explicitly tells us this in John 7, after narrating Jesus’ object lesson about “living water”:

John 7:39 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..

Once again, we see the universal nature of the coming Spirit, Who would be given to “those who believe”, not just a subset of believers.  Once given in this manner, He would no longer dwell “with” a few empowered kings or prophets, but would live “in” all believers (Jn 14:16).  Paul would later confirm that only those outside of Christ would lack such an indwelling of the Spirit (Rom 8:9).  Therefore just as John anticipated, Jesus anticipated a forthcoming two-state system consisting of: Those who don’t receive the Spirit (i.e. unbelievers) vs those who do receive the Spirit (i.e. believers). Assuming Jesus is referring to the same event in John 7:39, John 14:16, and Acts 1:4, He envisages a transitional period where all Old Testament believers would be upgraded to a new kind of “Spirit filled” salvation. The new kind of salvation would be:

• A change in the Spirit’s role (From “had not been given” to given — Jn 7:39, From being”with” to dwelling “in” — Jn 14:16)
• Eschatological (Mt 3:12)
• Intended for all believers (“those who believe” receive Spirit — Jn 7:39, Believers baptized in Holy Spirit [wheat] vs Unbelievers burned with unquenchable fire [chaff] — Mt 3:11-12)

In obedience to Christ, the disciples hung in the “upper room” and waited for this promised empowerment and indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  In Acts 2, the fulfillment of the promise begins with a small remnant of believing Jews.

The fulfillment of the promise to the Jews

We see from this account that something spectacular happened, which has never been repeated.  A phenomenon similar to literal fire appeared over the heads of the disciples, and an actual wind blew over the crowd.  Immediately the remnant of disciples began speaking in other tongues, and the crowd understood what they were saying.  The occasion was of extreme supernatural character.  Given this additional information, let us expand our list from above.  The giving of the Spirit was:

• A change in the Spirit’s role
• Eschatological
• Intended for all believers
• Attended by spectacular non-repeated phenomena (e.g. fire-like phenomena, rushing wind)
• Attended by a miraculous endowment of tongues given to a remnant of disciples

The transitional, inaugural nature of Pentecost is evident.  As Robert Saucy notes:

The experiences of the believers at Pentecost (Acts 2) … usually cited as evidence of a two-stage Christian experience, represent the inaugural coming of the Spirit on different groups … during the transition from the old covenant to that of the new age of the Spirit.[iii]

What were the tongues in Acts 2?

I would like to spend a little time addressing the miracle of tongues that occurred on Pentecost. The Greek word glossa, translated as “tongue” in Acts 2, is a metonymy for human dialects throughout the New Testament (Rom 14:11, Php 2:11, and Rev 5:9).  The fact that the phrase, “hear we every man in our own tongue [Gr. Dialektos]” (v8) is reiterated in v11 as the phrase, “we do hear them speak in our tongues [Gr. Glossa]”, proves that the same metonymy is used here in Acts 2. In between these two summary verses we are provided with a list of the languages represented in the crowd (e.g. Parthians, Medes, Elamites, etc.).  So both dialektos and glossa are intended to mean “human language” in this context.  They were human languages which were suddenly spoken, without compulsion, without training, without suggestion.

Some Pentecostals attempt to downgrade the tongues here to an unintelligible gibberish, perhaps an angelic language, followed by a gift of interpretation granted to the audience.  However, the hearers were still unregenerate Jews who had not yet received the Holy Spirit (See v38), thereby disqualifying them from having such a gift of the Spirit.  No, the crowd’s amazement was that “Galileans” could “speak” in their tongues (v7). Peter’s reference to Joel’s prophecy in v16ff clearly associates the miracle with those who “prophesy”, not with those who miraculously “hear” something. Prophecy is inspired speech that is delivered to its audience in a language they can understand.  No Jew who was familiar with the Old Testament would have equated unintelligible babbling with the “prophesying” predicted by Joel.  Let’s observe Peter’s take on this prophecy, and how it relates to the phenomena at Pentecost.

Even older promises

Acts 2:16 But this is what was uttered through the prophet Joel: 17 “‘And in the last days it shall be, God declares, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams; 18 even on my male servants and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit, and they shall prophesy. 19 And I will show wonders in the heavens above and signs on the earth below, blood, and fire, and vapor of smoke; 20 ​the sun shall be turned to darkness and the moon to blood, before the day of the Lord comes, the great and magnificent day. 21 And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.’ 

Peter knew that this outpouring was not only tied to the promises made by Jesus and John the Baptist, but also to the promise made long ago by the prophet Joel.  Actually, there were several Old Testament prophecies regarding this outpouring of the Spirit onto Israel.

Isaiah 44:3 For I will pour water on the parched ground and cause streams to flow on the dry land. I will pour my Spirit on your offspring and my blessing on your children.

Ezekiel 39:29 And I will not hide my face anymore from them, when I pour out my Spirit upon the house of Israel, declares the Lord GOD.”

Note that the initial outpouring of the Spirit was experienced by a remnant of Jews, in direct fulfillment of these prophecies to Israel.  The prophecies for Israel not only promised the coming Spirit, but even more so the coming Kingdom of God.  The Jews were promised to be the kingdom recipients who would welcome “all nations” into the kingdom (Gen 18:18, 22:18, Isa 2:2).  Knowing this, Jesus’ Jewish disciples asked him about the imminence of the coming kingdom.  Check out his answer to them:

Acts 1:6 So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” 7 He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority.8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

Jesus’ answer is quite revealing.  The kingdom was not yet arriving in Jerusalem for all nations to flow to, as is pictured in Isaiah 2:2 (At least not yet!).  The kingdom would only be coming in its inaugural form, which is a spiritual form.  The disciples were to start spreading it through the power of the Spirit.  So, instead of the nations flowing to the physical kingdom, the spiritual kingdom was going to the nations!  This expansion would happen in three primary categories:  Jews, Samaritans, Gentiles (i.e. ends of the earth).  As expected, these are the categories of people that receive the Spirit en masse in the book of Acts.

The Acts 2:38 Pattern

The Spirit is first offered to the larger audience of dispersed Israel, contingent upon repentance and water baptism:

Acts 2:5 Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven … 22 Men of Israel, hear these words: … 38 And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself

Many Jews heeded this command.  Even a small group of John’s Jewish disciples, dispersed as far as Ephesus, were accordingly baptized in the Spirit after meeting the Acts 2:38 conditions.  John the Baptist had instructed them to believe in the forthcoming Messiah, knowing that this Messiah coming “after” him would baptize them in the Spirit (Mt 3:11).  Here is the encounter they had with Paul:

Acts 19:1 … Paul passed through the inland country and came to Ephesus. There he found some disciples.2 And he said to them, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?” And they said, “No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit.”3 And he said, “Into what then were you baptized?” They said, “Into John’s baptism.”4 And Paul said, “John baptized with the baptism of repentance, telling the people to believe in the one who was to come after him, that is, Jesus.”5 On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.6 And when Paul had laid his hands on them, the Holy Spirit came on them, and they began speaking in tongues and prophesying.

In Acts 8, we see the second category of people being baptized in the Spirit – the Samaritans.  They were made up of Israelites who were not exiled when the Northern Kingdom was destroyed in 722 BCE— mixed with ethnic groups whom the Assyrians had resettled in the area.  The pure Jews didn’t get along with this alleged hybrid Jewish race, so this event was a monumental sign for the Jews.  Let’s look at it:

Acts 8:12 But when they [the Samaritans] believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women…Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word of God, they sent to them Peter and John, 15 who came down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit,16 for he had not yet fallen on any of them, but they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus.17 Then they laid their hands on them and they received the Holy Spirit.

Notice their water baptism made them eligible to receive the Spirit by the laying on of the apostles’ hands, according to the pattern given to the Jews in Acts 2:38.  This pattern was meticulously followed for Jewish groups, hybrid Jewish groups (i.e. Samaritans), and Messianic Jewish groups (i.e. John’s disciples).

Why are these Jewish-related, apostle-initiated baptisms in the Spirit different than the first one?  Why did these ones have water baptism as a prerequisite?  I believe it was to fulfill the below prophecies of Ezekiel and Isaiah, which link water to the forthcoming indwelling and outpouring of the Spirit onto Israel:

Ezek 36:25 I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. 26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.

Isa 44:3 For I will pour water on the parched ground and cause streams to flow on the dry land. I will pour my Spirit on your offspring and my blessing on your children.

Jesus himself made such an association in John 3:5:

John 3:5 Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

“When Jesus tells Nicodemus to be born ‘of the water and the Spirit’, he is calling Nicodemus to undergo a ‘spiritual’ proselyte baptism, i.e. a baptism in the Holy Spirit.”[iv] The fact that he scolded Nicodemus, a “teacher of Israel” (v10), for not understanding “these things” strengthens the notion that the Acts 2:38 pattern was already plainly anticipated in Israel’s prophetic hopes. Yet the pattern was not merely prophesied and then fulfilled in Israel; the apostles subsequently established it as the ecclesiastical norm for the new covenant community. Baptism became the initiating sacrament by which believers were incorporated into the covenant and the Spirit-filled community of the Church.

Thus, while the initial Pentecost phenomenon inaugurated the covenantal transition without requiring the ordinary sequence later associated with baptism and the gift of the Spirit, the subsequent Jewish-related outpourings established the normative pattern: baptism as the covenantal rite of initiation into the Spirit-filled community. The later “Gentile Pentecost” of Acts 10, as we will see, demonstrates that God could sovereignly reverse this sequence as a sign of Gentile inclusion, without thereby overturning the ecclesiastical norm.

The fulfillment of the promise to the Gentiles

Acts 10:44 While Peter was still saying these things, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word.45 And the believers from among the circumcised who had come with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit was poured out even on the Gentiles.46 For they were hearing them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Then Peter declared, 47 “Can anyone withhold water for baptizing these people, who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?”48 And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days.

So now we have the Gentiles receiving the Spirit in a manner similar to the initial remnant of Jews – Unexpectedly, sovereignly, and accompanied with revelatory sign gifts!  Peter later describes this Gentile phenomenon to Jewish Christians in Jerusalem, directly relating it to John’s promised baptism in the Spirit:

Acts 11:15 As I began to speak, the Holy Spirit fell on them just as on us at the beginning.16 And I remembered the word of the Lord, how he said, ‘John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit.’17 If then God gave the same gift to them as he gave to us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I that I could stand in God’s way?” 18 When they heard these things they fell silent. And they glorified God, saying, “Then to the Gentiles also God has granted repentance that leads to life.”

Some immediate observations stand out to me in Acts 10-11.  First, Peter associates this event with the Spirit that fell upon the initial remnant of Jews “at the beginning” (11:15), i.e. at Pentecost, not with any other “Spirit giving” events in between, such as the Samaritan event.  This shows that, in the apostles’ minds, there were two main inaugural baptisms in the Spirit – Jewish and Gentile.  These inaugural Spirit baptisms were unexpected, spectacular, and accompanied with miraculous verbal gifts.  They were not apostle-initiated, nor did they require water baptism (like Acts 2:38 seemed to require it for the Jews)[v].  Secondly, the tongues here, and elsewhere in Acts are typically tied to the Jewish onlookers.  Luke notes, “Believers from among the circumcised [Jews] who had come with Peter were amazed” (Acts 10:45).  This shows that the inaugural display of tongues was primarily a sign for Jews, both unbelieving Jews (Acts 2:5, 1 Cor 14:21-22, Mark 16:16), and believing Jews, to confirm that God was opening up “repentance” to all tribes and tongues (Acts 11:18).  Saucy agrees:

Since the occurrence of tongues takes place with the first Spirit-baptism of different groups of people (i.e., Jews, Acts 2; possibly Samaritans, ch. 8; Gentiles, ch. 10; those moving from old to new covenant salvation experience, ch. 19), it is far more convincing to me to see tongues as the physical evidence of the coming of the Spirit marking the inauguration of the new covenant salvation for each of the new groups rather than the Spirit’s empowering as a second work.’[vi]

To summarize the inaugural nature of the giving of the Spirit in Acts, it was:

• A change in the Spirit’s role
• Eschatological
• Intended for all believers
• Attended by spectacular non-repeated phenomena
• Attended by a miraculous endowment of tongues given to a remnant of disciples. The tongues were a sign to confirm to confirm to the Jews that God was opening up “repentance” to all tribes and tongues
• A fulfillment of prophecy to the Jews (e.g. Joel 2:28)

The Baptism in the Spirit today

Though the narrative of Acts suggests that some people received their baptism in the Spirit after they believed, we can’t lose sight of the fact that:  1) The outpouring of the Spirit was always prophesied to coincide with rebirth, 2) Rebirth was a New Covenant concept, 3) Rebirth would be associated with faith in the resurrected Christ, 4) All forms of faith, including Messianic faith, were incomplete prior to the resurrection of Christ.  Let’s start with point #1. Observe a few prophecies about the coming of the Holy Spirit:

Isa 44:3 For I will pour water on the parched ground and cause streams to flow on the dry land. I will pour my Spirit on your offspring and my blessing on your children.

Ezek 36:26 And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.27 And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.

Jer 31:33 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts… 34 And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know me…”

The Old Testament prophets never suggested separate promises of “outpouring”, “indwelling”, and “new birth”, occurring at different occasions for future believers.  Nor does the Book of Acts suggest such a distinction.  The initial baptisms in the Spirit, with their attendant signs and wonders, fulfilled God’s promise to pour out His Spirit on the true Israel.  The new birth and indwelling Spirit were now to be the norm for all people groups, both Jew and Gentile — for all New Covenant believers.  Consider these New Testament passages that explicitly relate our New Covenant experience of the Spirit to the promises of Jeremiah:

1 Jn 2:27 But the anointing that you received from him abides in you, and you have no need that anyone should teach you. But as his anointing teaches you about everything, and is true, and is no lie…

Jn 14:26 But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.

Since the New Covenant has come, the Holy Spirit has been given to teach each believer in the same manner predicted by the prophets. John tells us, “You have no need that anyone should teach you”.  This is strikingly similar to what Jeremiah promised — “no longer shall each one teach his neighbor” (Jer 31:34). This teaching ministry of the Spirit is not limited to a subset of believers. It is for all believers in the New Covenant era. For “the world cannot receive Him, because it neither sees him nor knows him.” (Jn 14:17).  Taking it a step further, if Jesus (and John) suggested that all believers partake of the promises of Jeremiah 31, then we can infer that they partake of all of the prophesied promises of the Spirit — the “outpouring” of Isaiah; the “indwelling” of Ezekiel. For it is evident that Jeremiah’s prophesied “New Covenant”, also called the “everlasting covenant” (Jer 32:40), is identical with Isaiah’s and Ezekiel’s “everlasting covenant” (Isa 42:6, 55:3, Ezek 37:26).  All of these prophets inextricably linked the coming of the covenant with the coming of the Spirit, and all of His ministries. These prophesied ministries of the Spirit are integral to the new covenant experience of rebirth (Jn 3:3-9), an experience which the Old Testament people, whether saint or sinner, had not experienced before the resurrection of Christ (Points #2, #3).  Because of that, many people who were already “saved” in some sense still needed an upgraded salvation (e.g. Acts 19:1f), a New Covenant salvation (Point #4)!  This upgrade came en masse to many groups of people in a short period of time, and it came in a spectacular, inaugural way.  Pentecostals often confuse this initial salvation “upgrade” with a “salvation” => “subsequent baptism in the Holy Spirit” pattern today.  Paul would disagree.

To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good … the utterance of wisdom … the utterance of knowledge … faith … gifts of healing … the working of miracles … prophecy… the ability to distinguish between spirits … various kinds of tongues … the interpretation of tongues.11 All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills … For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body— Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. (1 Cor 12:7-13)

Here Paul is speaking about the same baptism in the Spirit that John the Baptist promised, using the same Greek preposition en.  He says, “For in (Gr. en) one Spirit we were all baptized”, which is parallel with John’s promise “He will baptize you with (Gr. en) the Holy Spirit”.  I call that a match.

So what does Paul teach us here?  First of all, since the context of v7-13 is about the miraculous Spiritual gifts, he is relating the Spirit baptism to miraculous empowerment, just as Jesus did, and just as the apostles experienced in Acts (contrary to some folks who believe Paul’s focus is sanctification while Luke’s focus in Acts is power).  Secondly, he is teaching that the baptism in the Spirit baptizes us into the body of Christ.  It makes us Christians!  This refutes the Pentecostal and charismatic notion that the baptism in the Spirit is subsequent to conversion.

To summarize, Acts documents a massive transition from Old Testament “salvation”, which did not encompass New Birth and Spirit Indwelling, to New Covenant “salvation”, which did!  All of the people who received the baptism in the Spirit in Acts were being incorporated en masse into the newly formed body of Christ.  Today, all New Covenant believers start off with this New Covenant salvation, not an Old Testament salvation that needs upgraded.  They are immediately filled with, regenerated by, and indwelt by the Holy Spirit individually!  So the apparent “second” experience some people had in Acts was really a “first” experience of what we all experience today as believers.

A Matter of Semantics

Of course, there are many evangelicals who claim that this description of the baptism in the Spirit doesn’t mesh with some post-salvation experience they had.  But what if they are simply using wrong semantics?  Let’s look at some language Paul uses for post-salvation experiences with the Spirit:

Eph 5:18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit,19 addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart,20 giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,21 submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

The “filling” of the Spirit can be a gradual thing, or one or more distinct experiences following conversion.  In the book of Acts, we see instances where people who were already baptized in the Spirit were later filled with the Spirit and further empowered for bold witness:

Acts 4:8 Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers of the people and elders…

Acts 4:31 And when they had prayed, the place in which they were gathered together was shaken, and they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and continued to speak the word of God with boldness.

Keener notes:

Acts indicates that believers may receive empowerments subsequent to their “second experience” (4:8, 31; 13:9). Paul likewise speaks of living a Spirit-filled life (Eph. 5:18), walking by the same Spirit one has already received (Gal. 5:16–23) … These passages suggest that the whole sphere of the Spirit’s work becomes available at conversion, but believers may experience some aspects of the Spirit’s work only subsequent to conversion.[vii]

So much divisiveness could be avoided if Pentecostals employed this “filling” language with regard to post-salvation experiences, rather than impose a two stage model of Christianity (Christians vs. Spirit-baptized Christians).  Surely they believe in a powerful work of the Spirit during conversion, as evangelicals do.  Why not call that the “baptism in the Spirit”, as Paul does?  On the other hand, non-Pentecostal evangelicals believe in powerful experiences of the Spirit subsequent to conversion.  Why not call those occasions the “filling of the Spirit”, as Luke does?  I like to think of it this way:  The baptism in the Spirit was our initial “filling” by the Spirit (Acts 2:4), but not every “filling” of the Spirit is the baptism in the Spirit!

Go to Part 2 of this series to explore our position on the gifts of the Spirit.

End Notes:

[i] Some might classify Keener in the third wave category, but I placed him in the open but cautious category because of his insistence on tongues being intelligible language, prophecy being infallible, and all revelatory gifts being scrutinized meticulously

[ii] Keener, Craig.  Gift and Giver: The Holy Spirit for Today [E-book]. Grand Rapids, MI:  Baker’s Academic, 2001.  “The Spirit and Salvation”

[iii] Saucy, Robert (Article).  Grudem, Wayne (General Editor).  Gundry, Stanley (Series Editor).  “Are Miraculous Gifts for Today? Four Views”. Zondervan Academic (October 11, 2011).  Pg 98.

[iv] Keener. “When are we Baptized in the Spirit?”

[v] Those who are dogmatic about the necessity of water baptism for new birth should consider this, especially since we are in the times of the Gentiles (Lk 21:24).  A strict adherence to the Acts 2:38 pattern seems misplaced in the church age. Some may argue that Acts 2:39 places the repent–be baptized–receive the Spirit “promise” on all future people that the Lord will call, including Gentiles. However, the “Promise” does not include the conditions. The “Promise” is the “Spirit” Himself (Acts 1:4, 2:33), and God sovereignly decides how and when to grant the Spirit (John 3:8). In the case of the first Jews, He desired a more stringent Acts 2:38 sequence. However, in the case of the Gentiles, such a sequence was not as important. Nevertheless, water baptism still served an important role for Gentiles, as Peter immediately wanted to baptize Cornelius’ household after they believed (Acts 10:47). So even though the water baptism/Spirit baptism sequence wasn’t as rigid, the two events should still be proximate to each other.

[vi] Saucy.  Pg 303.

[vii] Keener.  “When are we Baptized in the Spirit?”

[viii] Saucy. Pg 123.

[ix] Saucy. Pg 128.

[x] Saucy.  Pg 100.

[xi] Keener.  “When are we Baptized in the Spirit?”

[xii] Keener. “A Closer Look at Some Spiritual Gifts”

[xiii] Saucy.  Pg 148.

[xiv] Keener.  “A Closer Look at Some Spiritual Gifts”

[xv] Saucy.  Pg 161.

[xvi] Saucy.  Pg 232.

[xvii] Saucy. Pg 331.

[xviii] Saucy. Pg 329.

[xix] Saucy.  Pg 101.

[xx] Keener.  “Tongues and the Spirit”

[xxi] Saucy. Pg 131.

[xxii] Saucy.  Pg 128.

[xxiii] Keener.  “A Closer Look at Some Spiritual Gifts”