I know there are alot of people out there, taught that the "Baptism of the Holy Ghost" is seperate from recieving Salvation. The problem is, how can we claim it seperate, when God declares, "be baptised for the remission of sins, and recieve the Gift of the Holy Ghost."?
We need to remember, as seen in Acts 10 where Peter was ministering to Gentiles, as they believed, recieved the Holy Ghost and started speaking in tongues. But, why do we think then, only "speaking in tongues" refers to the "baptism of the Holy Spirit"? And they had not been water baptised either as yet.
That is only one of many signs of the "infilling" of the Holy Spirit for a child of God, changed hearts, changes in thier lives, perceptions, attitude, etc. If we already have the Holy Spirit dwelling within us from recieving Salvation, how then can we be "baptised in the Holy Spirit" again, a second time, if already there? We can't.
Christ told the Apostles, on the appointed day, they would recieve the Holy Ghost and power. (Notice tho, the Apostles were not baptised and recieved the Holy Ghost before that either). Well, when each person becomes saved and reborn, they recieve the same thing. But, as Christ clearly showed when here on earth, it depends upon the faith and belief in God each Child has, for how much the Holy Spirit can demonstrate that power thru them.
Jesus went to a settlement or two, where He could do few miracles and more because of thier unbelief. And He declares- "have faith in God to say unto this mountain, be tho removed and be thou cast into the sea..." "and shall not doubt in his heart, but believeth that which he sayeth..." "it shall come to pass".
People can believe enough in God and the Trinity to recieve Salvation and the "Gift of the Holy Spirit." Yet, it can take time to develope the faith and belief in the rest of God Promises, to see those things happen in our lives. It has nothing to do with a "baptism of the Holy Ghost", but our committment to God and living for Him in belief and practice of His Word.
I know some want to believe in a special "baptism" of the Holy spirit seperate from Salvation. Thats fine. But, they are missing out and also misleading other of God's Children in not seeing more of the Holy spirit working thru them, by holding Him back this way.
Rather, because the Holy Spirit is already there in us, lets teach other of God's children to work more at deepening thier relationship, service and focus on God, so the Holy Spirit can be witnessed a whole lot more thru them. Why? If the Holy Spirit is already in us since recieving Salvation, the Power of God by the Holy Spirit is already there, in the Holy Spirit in us too.
Yes, some point out Paul "baptising" a group of people in the Holy spirit. He asked them if had been. hehe, well, they were "believers" in God and the Trinity, but not saved and reborn "Believers". What?
Read in the Gospels about the time Jesus and His Disciples were walking along and came upon this person doing great miracles and more in Jesus' Name and the Disciples wanted to go stop him. Jesus said no. Why?
Why would the disciples want to stop him? Why did Jesus say no? Because, this man had an incredible belief in God and Christ so God did such things for the man, because of this belief and faith. But, when he came to Jesus on thier return trip, Jesus rejected him, telling him to be gone, for He did not know him.
This was a lesson to learn of someone who can have incredible belief and faith in God and Christ, to see great things done by God for them. But, they are still lost to God because of lack of Salvation- (saved by Grace not of works).
And I don't know about the rest of you, but have noticed in my own life, as well as others over the years, where the Holy Spirit can only demonstrate His Power thru God's Children, to the level we allow, by the faith and belief we have in God and His Word.
The old adage- "practice makes perfect" holds true, at least to an extent. The more you spend time reading and studying God's Word, the more it becomes natural to speak it and live it in any situation. The more you study it, the more God, by the Holy spirit reveals to you. The more Its read and more revealed, the stronger our belief, thus faith, grows. The more that grows, the closer we grow to God and more the Holy spirit helps us to live by those Words. On and on.
Have you ever paid close attention to the first few verses of Job 1, where God describes the kind of man he was in God's eyes - (Job 1:1-3,5)? Thats the kind of man for God I want to be. So strong in faith, speech and actions, God had a hedge of protection around him, Satan would not even try to attack him- (1:10).
Even tho God's children such as Abraham, Lot, David, Daniel, Job, Peter and others had shown how falable they were, because of thier sincere committment to God, God Blessed them incredibly. And yet, each one had thier downfalls, trials, temptations and more they fell to.
Thats why God teaches us if we lean more on Him, as the others did, we can become "overcomers" as they had also and be Blessed even more so for it.
Living God's Word is a daily thing. Practices of reading and studying It should be daily things, that we can grow, enough to let the Holy spirit take over guidance of more and more of our lives as we go along.
At work, if all you ever do is something different every day, you learn alot, but never get really good at any of it. But, if you go to work doing the same thing over and ver every day, you come to where you can do it in your sleep. It becomes natural to you, just like living for God too if we do this.
The more we lean on God, the more we will be sure of ourselves because God is leading us more. All the while, the witness projected thru us to the unsaved will also grow and improve, thus drawing them to us to find out what the deal is.
God Bless!!