Have You Been Baptized in the Spirit?
by Dr. Graham Standish
Acts 8:14-24
January 10, 2010
Now when the apostles at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. The two went down and prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit (for as yet the Spirit had not come upon any of them; they had only been baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus). Then Peter and John laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit. Now when Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money, saying, ‘Give me also this power so that anyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.’ But Peter said to him, ‘May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could obtain God’s gift with money! You have no part or share in this, for your heart is not right before God. Repent therefore of this wickedness of yours, and pray to the Lord that, if possible, the intent of your heart may be forgiven you. For I see that you are in the gall of bitterness and the chains of wickedness.’ Simon answered, ‘Pray for me to the Lord, that nothing of what you have said may happen to me.’
On April 14th, 1906, on a small street in Los Angeles, something significant happened that changed the face of Christianity. A movement was started by someone few would have selected as the leader of a major movement. The man’s name was William Joseph Seymour, and he was a half-blind, self-educated African-American who had only recently moved to Los Angeles.
Seymour was the son of former slaves. His father had escaped slavery at the onset of the Civil War and had joined a Union Army “negro” regiment to fight the South. After the war his parents wandered the country until finally settling in Louisiana. The family was so poor that at one point they listed their family possessions as a chair, a table, and a chest of drawers. Who would have expected a man from this environment to launch the fastest growing Christian movement of the 20th century, and so far of the 21st.
Seymour had studied under the evangelical theologian, Charles Parham, in the late 1890s, and was fascinated by Parham’s emphasis on getting back to the original church by getting back to the experience of Pentecost. Parham taught that the modern church had forgotten about the Holy Spirit, and that it needed to become open and aware of the Spirit. Otherwise the church could do nothing because the Spirit is the engine of life for the church.
So, beginning on April 14th, in 1906, Seymour gathered people in a small house in Los Angeles, and taught them to become radically open to the Holy Spirit. Soon people were manifesting gifts and signs of the Spirit. Many spoke in tongues, which means that they spoke in a language often identified as God’s language (the apostle Paul called it “glossalia”), but which sounds unintelligible to us. Others prophesied. One woman, who swore that she had never taken piano lessons, was suddenly able to play the piano. Over the course of the ensuing months more and more people flocked to Seymour’s gathering, hoping to be touched by the Holy Spirit. Soon they bought a church on Asuza Street in Los Angeles, and thus began the “Asuza Street Revival,” which many see as the birth of the Pentecostal movement.
The Pentecostal movement has grown at an amazing pace in the U.S. In the early parts of the 21st century it was growing at a rate of 250% per year in the U.S., and 500% world-wide. There is something about becoming open to the Holy Spirit that tangibly touches people.
I’m not a Pentecostal by any stretch of the imagination, nor am I anywhere close to suggesting that we become Pentecostals here. Still, I think that the Pentecostals recovered an idea that many of us other Christians ignore, an idea mentioned in our passage. Did you hear the part in the passage where they mentioned being baptized in the Holy Spirit? It says, “Then Peter and John laid their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.” What do you think it means to receive the Holy Spirit?
In the Pentecostal tradition, receiving the Holy Spirit (being baptized in the Holy Spirit) means both receiving the power of the Spirit within us, and manifesting the Spirit through gifts such as speaking in tongues, holy laughter, prophesy, healing, and more.
Again, I’m not ready to suggest that we become Pentecostals, but I do believe that there’s something to their experience. But let me give you a little context to what I mean. As you already know, I’m a bit of an odd duck. I don’t think the way many, or even most, Christians think. I tend to think more in terms of how to bring things together rather than determining what’s right and what’s wrong. I believe that we live in a day-and-age in which people are stuck looking for the exact “right” answer to everything. We live in an “either-or” age in which people believe the answers to all questions, situations, problems, and crises has to be either this or that. I don’t agree. I believe that often the best answers are “both-and,” which means that sometimes the truth encompasses many different belief perspectives. For example, I’m not a Roman Catholic, nor will I ever become one, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t believe that some of what they do is right. I believe in sharing the sacrament of communion weekly, as do the Roman Catholics, because I recognize that weekly communion has an amazing power to connect people with God. As a result we have communion every Sunday during our first service. Like the evangelicals, I believe in a personal relationship with Christ, and as a result I preach about experiencing Christ in our lives. And like the Pentecostals I believe in the power of the Holy Spirit.
One reason we have such an extensive healing ministry is due to my belief in the legitimacy of something the Pentecostals recovered, which is that prayer can heal. I may not believe in the idea that when faith and prayer connect with healing, it should be evidently miraculous the way we see on television with televangelists. I don’t go quite that far. Still, I believe God that God heals, and that God responds to prayer. But unlike many Pentecostals, I believe that healing can come just as much through the hands of doctors and nurses as it can come miraculously. God can heal through both. I don’t believe in either prayer or medicine. I believe in both prayer and medicine.
What all of this means is that I believe that we should work in our faith to become more intentionally open to the Holy Spirit. I don’t believe we should do this to become more Pentecostal. I believe we should do it in order to become more authentically Christian. At the same time, my understanding of what it means to receive and be baptized in the Holy Spirit is different from the Pentecostals. I believe that the sacrament of baptism we do is an important baptism because it connects all of us with God’s grace, a grace that cleanses all of us. At the same time, I believe that there comes a point at which we also need to make a radical decision: am I willing to become open to the Spirit, let it enter my life, and help me to live in God’s way? When we do this, life changes in amazing ways.
So what happens when we are baptized in the Holy Spirit—when we receive the Spirit? I believe that four basic experiences grow in our lives.
First, we begin having a sense of connection with something beyond. We begin to experience the Divine, the Holy, God, in a tangible way that leads us to know God exists. We don’t need objective proof of God’s existence because we have tangible experiences of God. Just as when we fall in love we don’t need someone to prove to us objectively that love is real, when we are open to the Spirit we don’t need proof that God is real. We develop a tangible connection with God that moves beyond objective proof.
Second, we begin having an intuitive sense of what God wants in each moment of life. We develop more than a connection. We gain a sense of God’s will. This is more than just knowing what is right or wrong in life. It’s a sense of simply knowing in each moment what God wants. I don’t want to make it sound as though this sense of God’s will makes each of us an ultimate authority on what God wants. I’m not talking about having a grand sense of what kind of healthcare system God wants for our country. Our sense of God’s will is humbler than that. It’s simply a sense of knowing what God wants for our lives.
Third, we develop a sense of knowing where we fit in life. I believe that one of the primary problems of modern culture is that too many people don’t know where they fit. They wander, wondering what the purpose is for their lives. The Spirit helps us come to know where we fit. That fit may be in something very small, recognizing that where we fit is in simply serving God in simple ways. Whatever our place of fit is, the Spirit leads us to know where that place is, and to accept it.
Finally, we experience coincidences. I believe that experiencing holy coincidences, or providences, is the hallmark of receiving the Holy Spirit. The Spirit makes things happen. Most of these providences are small, and act just as reminders that God is with us in joyful ways. For example, one coincidence has happened as I preached this sermon. The choir sang a song, “I See the Light,” which was an early 20th century gospel song that was a favorite among the early Pentecostals (this is a different song from the Hank Williams song of the same name). What was coincidental about them singing this song was that this hymn was a favorite among the early Pentecostals. And our choir chose the song almost by accident. They had to pick a song for this past Sunday that would work for the members who would be in worship. Because so many would be missing, they had a difficult time finding the right song. They went through six others before finally settling on “I See the Light.” The amazing thing is that by seeming accident they chose this song on the Sunday that I was preaching about Pentecostals. Out of all the Sundays to sing it, why this past Sunday? But this is the kind of thing that happens when we are open to the Spirit. We get joyful coincidences.
I don’t know how many of you actually believe in the ability to be baptized in the Spirit, but if you do and want to receive the Spirit, I have some suggestions. First, ask God to give you the Spirit. Do it simply and sincerely. Just ask God to let the Spirit enter your life. If you are sincere about it, you’ll receive the Spirit. And don’t worry about having some sort of “slain in the Spirit” experience. What I’ve learned over the years about God is that God is merciful, generous, loving, powerful, and polite. In other words, God’s not going to force something on you. You’ll experience the Spirit in a way that fits with your openness and personality.
Second, make a decision to be open to the Spirit in more moments of your life. Don’t just become open in one part. Bring the Spirit into every part. This is not as easy as it sounds. We compartmentalize. We make Sunday morning the time for God. Sunday afternoon is the time for football. Sunday evening? More football. Monday morning we go to work. In the evenings we watch television. Saturday is to play. Sunday is back to God. That’s not the way God wants it to work. God wants us to bring God into every moment of life by becoming open to the Spirit in every moment. God can be there to guide us and help us at church, at home, at work, and everywhere else, but only if we are open to the Spirit in each moment.
Finally, trust the Spirit to flow throughout your life. Trust that if you are open, wonderful things will happen. Learn to look for them. Learn to be open to them. Learn to expect them. If you do, you’ll discover the Spirit everywhere.
We’re called to receive the Spirit in our lives. Faith isn’t just supposed to be an intellectual activity. It’s meant to be a life activity. The question I want you to reflect on is this: how open you are to the Spirit?
Amen.
