As the #LentChallenge comes to an end—(can you believe it?!)—we’re inviting Dr. Craig Blomberg to weigh in on a few final questions.
You’ve probably wondered these 3 things yourself, too:
1. After reading Acts, I’m confused about the role of the Holy Spirit in the lives of believers. Acts 8:14-17 talks about how new believers had “simply been baptized into the name of the Lord Jesus” and that the “Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them.”
Are baptism of the Holy Spirit and receiving the Holy Spirit the same thing? Is there something besides accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior that needs to happen for people to receive the Holy Spirit?
There are two very different ways to answer these questions.
Modern Pentecostalism, which arose from the Azusa Street Revival and related events at the beginning of the twentieth century tends to see Acts 8 as normative for Christian practice. So they associate being baptized in the Spirit with a second blessing that involves supernatural phenomena, often speaking in tongues, as a sign of Christian maturity or even of salvation.
But the seven references to baptism in/of/with the Spirit in the New Testament (Matt. 3:11, Mark 1:9, Luke 3:16, John 1:33, Acts 1:5, Acts 11:16, 1 Cor. 12:13) all refer to the initial immersion of people into the Spirit’s power. 1 Corinthians 12:13 is particularly significant because it shows that all the Corinthian Christians, many of whom were very immature had been baptized in the Spirit.
Acts 8 seems to involve exceptional circumstances—the uniting of Jewish and Samaritan believers into one body—and nowhere else in the New Testament do we see the Spirit not coming on and into people when they first believe. Perhaps God deliberately delayed things so that the apostles from Jerusalem could see for themselves this unity and equality among previous enemies.
2. Along those same lines, what does it mean to be “filled with the Spirit,” as mentioned in Luke 1:15 and Acts 4:31? Were the disciples just full of the Spirit at select times? During other times, if they were not “full” of the Spirit, what were they?
Being filled with the Spirit is used throughout the New Testament of a repeated experience believers can have for powerful acts of obedience and service, especially in the context of boldly proclaiming and sharing God’s Word. Ephesians 5:18 has Paul commanding believers to be repeatedly filled with the Spirit (the force of the present tense Greek imperative).
From Pentecost to this present day, when a person trusts in Christ he or she is baptized and permanently indwelt by the Spirit.
The Spirit will always live in them and never leave them. But they can choose to quench or stifle the Spirit through rebellion, disobedience or apathy, something Paul warns against (1 Thess. 5:19). The Spirit is not controlling them at that point. Metaphorically, it is as if they have shoved the Spirit into a little corner of themselves, rather than allowing him to energize and fill their entire beings.
3. Reading the epistles in sweeping swathes like we have been these past few weeks has given me a better sense of that intimacy with God’s Word! But I do wonder, how did the letters get from one place to another during that time?
They were hand-carried by people who traveled from the location of the author to the location of the audience. Occasionally we are told who these people were—e.g., Tychicus (Col. 4:7-9, Eph. 6:21-22) or Phoebe (Rom. 16:1-2).
Bonus Question: What’s the best resource to find out more historical and cultural background information as we read the Bible after the #LentChallenge?
Good study Bibles are probably the best place to start. The notes in the NIV, ESV and/or NLT study Bibles are perhaps the three best. For more detail, IVP has two outstanding volumes called simply The IVP Bible Background Commentaries, one volume on the Old Testament and one on the New Testament.
Don’t let the end of the #LentChallenge stop you from diving into God’s Word every day. Don’t stop seeking. Don’t stop asking. Don’t stop studying.
To read more of Dr. Blomberg’s insights, pick up a copy of his latest book, Can We Still Believe the Bible? An Evangelical Engagement with Contemporary Questions, here
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This week we’re giving away this beautiful watercolor print made by Amarilys from Watercolor Devo.
Amarilys has had a flair for the arts as long as she can remember. But it wasn’t her formal training that made her creativity burst forth… it was having a baby, an awakening of her passions: Truth, Life, and Beauty. These keep bringing her back to her watercolor devo[tional] times. Discover more of her work at watercolordevo.com.
To win a print of this artwork, leave a comment on the original blog post at MargaretFeinberg.com. The winner will be selected and announced on Wednesday.
Congratulations to the winner: Christine
What is your takeaway from this #LentChallenge?
What passage, verse, word, or theme has echoed throughout our furiously fast trip through the New Testament?
