For some reason, in the UK we celebrate Mother's Day in March. Actually, this morning I was surprised to be able to attend a church in the European city I am visiting at the moment. There they celebrated Mother's Day, as well as Pentecost. The sermon was like a clear trumpet note for the type of experiential Chrisitanity I long for each of us to grow in. At the end, I had the opportunity to share that it seemed to me God was putting a bright future before the church and saying if they would "look at him and do likewise" as Gideon told his small group to do, they would know a season of great blessing.

Anyway, since this is an international blog, and, frankly, you moms deserve at least two days a year, HAPPY MOTHERS DAY! The following video is a fantastic summary of what it is in the life of mothers that can leave them feeling somewhat frazzled. Back on our UK Mother's Day, we showed our church this. You can hear my wife's reaction and thoughts on being a mum at the beginning of my Mother's Day sermon.

Yesterday I answered the final question in a series of questions on the Holy Spirit that I have been addressing. My answers to those questions were discussed in the following posts:

• What is Baptism in the Holy Spirit?
  
  
• How Do I Know If I Am Spirit Baptized?
  
  
• What Are the Results of Spirit Baptism?
  
  
• What of Those Who Are Not Baptized With the Spirit?
  
  
• What Do I Do Now?
  
  
• What Will the Baptism of the Holy Spirit Mean To Me?

Today I want to conclude with the words of an old hymn on which we can meditate and which can be made into a prayer. I find this hymn to be a great way to direct my heart God-ward to seek for a fresh taste of the Holy Spirit. Recently I downloaded an mp3 of this hymn being sung by worship leader, Matt Boswell. It is available on iTunes and you could do a lot worse than downloading and using it as part of your personal worship time.

All to Jesus, I surrender;
All to Him I freely give;
I will ever love and trust Him,
In His presence daily live.

RefrainI surrender all, I surrender all,
All to Thee, my blessed Savior,
I surrender all.

All to Jesus I surrender;
Humbly at His feet I bow,
Worldly pleasures all forsaken;
Take me, Jesus, take me now.

All to Jesus, I surrender;
Make me, Savior, wholly Thine;
Let me feel the Holy Spirit,
Truly know that Thou art mine.

All to Jesus, I surrender;
Lord, I give myself to Thee;
Fill me with Thy love and power;
Let Thy blessing fall on me.

All to Jesus I surrender;
Now I feel the sacred flame.
O the joy of full salvation!
Glory, glory, to His Name!

Words by Judson W. Van De Venter, 1896.
Accessed online at The Cyber Hymnal.
It is interesting to note that, in common with many today, the last verse is omitted from Boswell's version. I suppose that the notion of “full salvation” seems somehow foreign to us. To me, however, that is surely what receiving the Spirit is all about—assuring us that the deal is done, and that right now we are as fully saved as we ever will be when Jesus returns. 

I would like to get more versions of this recording.  If you are aware of a good quality recording of the hymn, I would be glad if you could point me to a legal download of such a recording.

What question would YOU like to submit for my next “ASK A BLOGGER”? Send me an e-mail at adrian.warnock@gmail.com with your question(s).

Today we come to the sixth question that my e-mail correspondent asked:

What will all this mean for me—will I have to stop being a conservative reformed believer? If not, what do people like me do differently after we receive the baptism of the Spirit in our churches?

In answer to your first question, of course not! There are an increasing number of people who hold to both reformed theology and an experience of the Holy Spirit. Some do this while still calling themselves cessationists, and there are many reformed brothers who secretly enjoy great intimacy with God. There are also growing numbers who identify themselves clearly as a Reformed Charismatic. Some of the people who could be described as “charismatic with a seatbelt,” and who are therefore good people to fill you with confidence that you do not have to turn away from your conservative roots totally are C. J. Mahaney, John Piper, Sam Storms, Wayne Grudem, Mark Driscoll, and Terry Virgo, among others. C. J. Mahaney has even preached for John MacArthur and plays golf with him, so us charismatics can’t all be off our heads!

You are so right to hint at the fact that the implications of all this for church life are profound. I cannot chart out a clear course for you. What I can say is that those very questions are the ones that led people like Terry Virgo to begin building very different types of churches to the ones he had grown up in. So in a sense Newfrontiers and similar groups are one set of answers to that question, but there are others.

You may be interested in reading more about how gifts of the Spirit have functioned in my own experience of being in charismatic churches which very definitely have seat belts firmly applied. I have written a series about this, which was sparked by a previous correspondent. To read those posts, follow the links in my post on tongues and interpretation.

Whatever you do, I wouldn't rush anything. It is very possible, at least initially, to simply enjoy a deeper relationship with God while everything in your church remains the same. If you are a leader of a church, you may want to try and lead that church through to a similar experience. Be careful, however, and think long and hard about whatever you plan as such a change is much harder than you might initially think. Find someone who has been in church leadership longer than you who can give sound advice about the next steps forward for you as an individual and for your church.

If you have been reading the blog for the last week or so, because of my series on baptism with the Holy Spirit, you might be forgiven for thinking that I was just a raving charismatic. The truth is, I am eager to emphasize the work of the Holy Spirit. But that is not all I want to stress here. As I once said in a previous post, “I Don't Want Balance . . . I Want It All.”

I thought, therefore, that I would take this opportunity to share a quote from Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones on the work of the Holy Spirit and the Bible. He is speaking about when the Apostles were praying in Acts 4:31.

“When they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together; and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost.” What did that lead to? “They spake the word of God with boldness.” We must never separate these two: “the Holy Spirit,” “the word of God.” If we ever do, we shall go astray.

Some people put their emphasis only on the “word.” These are the intellectuals. “Ah,” they say, “nothing matters but the word.” They spend their time reading and studying, and they become authorities on theology. As a result, they may become proud of their own great knowledge, and they may get the admiration of others who join in with them, but this is nothing but a little mutual admiration society. Nobody is converted; nobody is convicted. Heads packed with knowledge and understanding only—useless! “Word only,” you see.

And there are people who put the whole of their emphasis on the Holy Spirit. They are not interested in the Word. They say, “It doesn’t matter what a person believes.” I heard of a man recently who shouted out in a great meeting, “Let yourselves go! Let yourselves go!” And they did let themselves go, I am told. But the New Testament has never told anybody to let himself go. Never! The Holy Spirit does not merely produce an experience; the Holy Spirit uses the Word. He is the Spirit of truth, the Spirit of enlightenment. He is the Spirit who leads to understanding. We must never jettison the intellect God has given us. The Holy Spirit can deal with our brains as well as with any other part of us. It is a false teaching that urges people to let themselves go. If you do that, you are letting yourself go to a riot of the imagination and of the feelings. You are letting yourself go to evil spirits and powers that are around and about you and ever ready to possess you and to use you and to fool you. The Spirit and the Word! “They spake the word of God.” I repeat, the Word and the Spirit must never be separated.

Here is the work and the function of the Holy Spirit. He takes these facts—the wonderful works of God, the things that the apostles had seen and heard—and then shows their meaning. Christian preaching is not merely exhortation; it is not merely appeal; it is the recital of facts. The Holy Spirit enables people to bear witness to the facts, and then He shows their meaning and their significance to those listening.”

David Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Courageous Christianity, 1st U.S. edition, Crossway Books, Wheaton, Illinois, 2001, p. 193.

Today we reach the fifth of my correspondent's questions. It is, in many ways, the most admirable and crucial of all of them.

Having not been baptized by the Spirit, what would you recommend that I do now?

I began to answer this question in some ways in my previous Ask The Blogger post. In essence, the critical thing is to begin to desire this and to seek the experience God has for you. Of course, in order to desire this, you have to be convinced that it is from God, and that it is for you. I would advise some careful study of the Bible texts, focusing on Ephesians 1, Romans 5, Romans 8, Luke 11, and the whole book of Acts. As with salvation, faith comes by hearing the Word of God. Until you are convinced in your mind, your prayer will be half-hearted.

James 1:5-8 says, “If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.”

We could easily substitute for the word wisdom there, the words “the Holy Spirit.”

Fear is a common barrier to truly faith-filled asking. We worry that what we will receive will not be from God. The parable in Luke speaks of how the good father will give good gifts to his children. That is a very helpful place to go for prolonged meditation to ease one's doubts on this matter. God often tells his people in the Bible not to fear when he reveals himself to them. As his children we have nothing to fear from him.

Since faith comes by HEARING the Word of God, I would also like to strongly encourage you to LISTEN to helpful teaching on this subject, ideally in a face-to-face environment. If you are not near a good church where you can go to hear such teaching, and are not able to get to a conference like Together On a Mission, I very strongly recommend Terry Virgo's talk on “Receiving the Spirit.” This was linked on the first day of this series.

Ultimately, if you do not experience a filling of the Spirit from simply asking, it is perhaps time to humbly seek out a godly believer who can lay hands on you and pray for you that you might be filled. Don't set yourself up for a disappointment, however, by asking for such prayer until you are convinced that an experience is available and that you are qualified for that experience. Many people think they need to somehow “earn” the Holy Spirit. The truth is, all believers are qualifed. As Peter says in Acts 2, the promise for EVERYONE who God has called. So if you are called, the promise is availble for you. It is as if a check has already been written and signed by God and is now waiting to be cashed.

Today we reach the fourth in a series of questions asked by a reader:

What of those who are not baptized by the Spirit? Is it just God's sovereign choice? Will they just be doomed to life without the full power of the Spirit?

The Bible is clear that the Spirit can be quenched. Sadly, there are many things that conspire today to quench the work of the Spirit in our lives. This can include, as Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones explained, wrong teaching that we have received:

I strongly believe that God stands ready to send the Spirit to all who ask him. Now, we cannot dictate the timing of such an experience, nor its intensity. But we can rightly seek for Spirit-filling, and seek for it with faith.

One of the fundamental errors, in my view, in approaching this whole subject is in reading some of the promises of God concerning the Spirit and thinking they are automatically fulfilled. Thus, we see in Acts 2, when Peter is asked how to be saved, he urges his hearers to repent, be baptized, and then offers them the promise that they will receive the Holy Spirit. Incidentally, the language here is surely one of the clearest indications that repentance/faith and reviving the Spirit are two distinct events, that together with baptism and being “added” to the Church, make up the “normal Christian birth.” (See "The Simple Gospel Explained.")

When God makes a promise, often there are certain conditions attached. When it comes to receiving the Spirit, the Acts passage tells us that we should repent and be baptized, but it doesn't mention one more condition which, on reflection on other Scriptures, seems obvious. That condition is simply that we have to WANT the Holy Spirit, ask for him, and then deliberately and consciously receive him.

As Jesus says in Luke:

“If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (Luke 11:13)

To someone who feels they have not received the Holy Spirit, I would simply challenge them, “Have you asked God to give him to you? Have you asked repeatedly, earnestly, eagerly?” I do not believe God shows favoritism. I do believe that we are not meant to be merely passive on this point, waiting for the Spirit to act in his own timing. No, instead we should pursue God for him to bless us with everything within us. The blockage, I am convinced, is not with God, but with us.

UPDATE
I received the following question in an e-mail: "Can you explain more explicitly how Acts 2:38 is one of the clearest indications of the events being two separate ones . . . I understand, I think, why you say that, but I'd also like to know the argument for why other interpretations of this verse would be wrong. If I told a biblically literate cessationist that 2:38 is one of the clearest indications, what argument against that would they be likely to bring?"

I will leave my cessationist readers to explain their interpretation of this verse, except to say that I suppose they would see receiving the Spirit as an automatic event. To me, because Peter commands faith and repentance and, contingent on that, speaks of people being able to receive the Holy Spirit, we have to be talking about a different event to conversion. If the way you know that you have received the Spirit is that you have faith, then this sentence makes no sense. Also, Peter is clearly, to me, making a promise to the hearers and as many as God shall call that they will be able to seek for and actively receive the Holy Spirit.

Today I move on to the third in a series of questions I have received via e-mail on baptism with the Holy Spirit.

What do you think is the direct result of being baptized by the Spirit, i.e. what is the practical result in, say, the life of a pastor or missionary?

If we look in Acts, we see that the disciples were transformed by the outpouring of the Spirit.

1. They became more bold
   
   
2. They were empowered to preach in such a way that multitudes were saved.
   
   
3. They were unafraid to face opposition.
   
   
4. They devoted themselves to the work of God.
   
   
5. There was much joy in the churches.
   
   
6. Commitment to each other was strong.
   
   
7. Meetings happened daily.
   
   
8. There was powerful prayer with dramatic answers.

Their very characters were changed and the apostles we read about in Acts seem very different from the timid, argumentative, selfish disciples of the gospels. Someone like Paul was totally transformed by his experience of the Spirit.

Some or all of those results should be expected in the life of a believer filled with the Spirit. In writing to the Galatians, Paul asks, “Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” (Galatians 3:3—see my sermon on this passage.

The Spirit-filled person is conscious of another power within them. While we still work hard, that work is energized by another. The well-oiled heart makes many of life's problems seem somehow less difficult to face. Knowing the smile of God on us should give us confidence and assurance to do what he has called us to do.

The biggest change will hopefully be an end to persistent doubts and questionings about our own salvation. God pours out his spirit into our hearts as a foretaste of heaven, and to enable us to firmly understand that we are on our way there. The Spirit truly is a deposit that guarantees our inheritance (see Ephesians 1).

I suppose the difference is between strenuously pedaling a bicycle up a hill, and when over the brow of the hill, you begin to coast on the way down. It is certainly not wrong to pedal at this point, but doing so makes the ride even more exhilarating as you are no longer merely trying to get the bicycle going with your own effort, but are instead working with the mighty force of gravity!

But lest you think that us charismatics always live in the good of this experience, the answer is we do not. Even as I write this, I am convicted of my own need to go back to the Spirit for more power and more filling. I, too, have a tendency to try and live the Christian life in my own strength alone rather than relying on the Spirit’s enabling.

I have frequently quoted from the Doctor on sealing with the Spirit as I think he is very helpful in understanding the whole concept of Spirit baptism. He explains the functions of a seal, none of which can be adequately performed if the seal is something we don't know we have! More from the Doctor on sealing with the Spirit can be found here:

• Assorted Thoughts on the Baptism With the Holy Spirit
  
  
• MLJ Monday - Sealed with the Spirit, Part 1
  
  
• MLJ Monday - Sealed with the Spirit, Part 2
  
  
• MLJ Monday - Sealed with the Spirit, Part 3
  
  
• MLJ Monday - Sealing of the Spirit: Experiences and Gifts
  
  
• Round-Up - The Holy Spirit and the Charismatics
  
  
• Resurrection Empowered Life - The Deposit Guaranteering Our Inheritance

The Doctor was speaking about a verse from Ephesians 1 which, in the King James version, reads:

“In whom ye also trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise” (Ephesians 1:13).

Here is some of what he says about those words, which I have quoted previously here:

“I am increasingly persuaded that it is our failure to understand this precise statement that accounts for so much lethargy and failure among us as Christian people at the present time. At least I will go so far as to assert that any Christian who is not experiencing the joy of salvation is in that state very largely because of a failure to realize the truth taught in this particular verse of Scripture, for in it we are brought face to face with the way in which we can enter into the fullness which we should be experiencing in Christ. To ‘rejoice in the Lord' . . . is an essential part of God's purpose for us in Christ. Our Lord Himself, at the end of His life on earth, said not only, 'My peace I give unto you', but also 'My joy' (John 15:11). That is the heritage of a Christian. Christian people should be full of joy and of peace and of happiness . . . but if we feel that we are ineffective as Christians and that our usefulness is not very evident, then I suggest it is . . . [because of] our failure to realize what is meant by God's sealing of His children by 'that holy Spirit of Promise'. . . .

Sealing is a subject that has caused much controversy. It is not an easy subject, therefore; nevertheless, we must face it. . . . Let us first take 'sealing' in its ordinary meaning . . . a seal is that which authenticates or conveys authority. Two men may draw up an agreement; it may be to sell a house or arrange a business. . . . Another meaning which attaches to 'sealing' is that it is a mark of ownership. . . . It is to indicate that something, whatever it is, belongs to and is the property of the person who has used that particular seal. . . . Furthermore, a seal is also used for the purpose of security. . . . If [the] seal has in any way been broken or marred it is an indication that someone has been tampering with [it]. . . . Thus we find that there are three main meanings to this term 'sealing''—authenticity and authority, ownership, and security and safety' and these will help us to understand what is meant by our being 'sealed by that holy Spirit of Promise'.

From D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, An Exposition of Ephesians 1 — God's Ultimate Purpose, "Sealed With the Spirit," Baker Books, October 2003, chapter 21, pp. 243-254.

For more information on Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones see this summary post or the MLJ Recording Trust.

Jesse Phillips has kindly given me permission to share here an article he wrote on what he calls subsequence. This is the notion, as I prefer to describe it, that the baptism with the Holy Spirit is distinct to conversion. I prefer to describe this as distinct for the simple reason that the receiving of the Holy Sprit need not be delayed for months or years after conversion. This may sound like a minor point, but it is crucial to our expectations. Anyway, I loved what Jesse said about Peter's inspired comments on the day of Pentecost. You may not agree with everything he has to say in his complete article, since there are so many finely nuanced positions that Christians can take on this subject, but I commend it as well worthy of a read, as this quote demonstrates.

"The disciples had received the gift of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost (Acts 2:1-4). In 2:39 Peter, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, proclaims this same promise (“this promise is for you”), the promise of the Father, namely the gift of being clothed with power from on high in the Spirit, is available not just to the current generation (“you and your children”) but future generations (“all who are far off”).

What promise is Peter extending? Is he extending the promise of regeneration? He is making available to all what they had just experienced, which did not include regeneration. The “promise of [the] Father” was anointing and power (Luke 24:49) in the Spirit. Those who repent and believe (2:38) can receive the enabling spirit of promise (2:39). Therefore, the biblical precedent for using the Acts 2 narrative for doctrine is Acts 2:39, the first apostolic decree in the history of the church. Peter’s first apostolic decree was that the Pentecost reception of the gift of the Spirit was to be the continuing standard throughout all generations of the church. The charismatic promise of the Father is available for all! Based on this inspired interpretation of Pentecost and apostolic pronouncement of continuance, we are on safe ground interpreting this initial second blessing (and its outworking in Acts 8, 9, 10 and 19) as normative for today. Not only are we on safe ground, we are required to view it this way, if we are to be submitted to apostolic decree, even if we cannot point to any parallel event in our own experience. It may be that God has yet more for us to experience in accordance with the testimony of the early church."

— Jesse Phillips, Subsequence

On Thursday we began a series looking at several questions asked by an e-mail correspondent of mine. Today I will address his second question:

Does baptism by the Holy Spirit have to be accompanied by tongues? Does it have to be by the laying on of hands? How do you know that you have been baptized in the Spirit?

I will take these in reverse order. The last one is, in some ways, the easiest, although it is more difficult to put into words. It is like asking, “How do you know you are in love?” or “How do you know that was a beautiful painting?” At its center, the baptism of the Spirit is about the love of God being poured out into our hearts (Romans 5:5). I love John Piper's description of it, which he credits to Martyn Lloyd-Jones. It's not that the Spirit is entirely absent from the lives of believers before they receive him—far from it! No one can come to faith except by the Spirit; no one can exhibit any of the fruits of the Spirit without his work; every impulse to love and obey God comes from the Spirit. It’s just that we are not always very aware of his work within us. We often don’t relate to him as a person. We have not “received” him, nor do we feel him. He has not yet “fallen on us.”

The truth is, even those who have received the Spirit often forget him. I often need to come back to him, asking that I be made more aware of his work in my life. It is not an “all or-nothing” phenomenon. The most Spirit-filled believer has yet more to receive of him! Spurgeon expresses this very well as follows:

"Have ye then received the Spirit since you believed? Beloved, are you now receiving the Spirit? Are you living under his divine influence? Are you filled with his power? Put the question personally. I am afraid some professors will have to admit that they hardly know whether there be any Holy Ghost; and others will have to confess that though they have enjoyed a little of his saving work, yet they do not know much of his ennobling and sanctifying influence. We have none of us participated in his operations as we might have done: we have sipped where we might have drunk; we have drunk where we might have bathed; we have bathed up to the ankles where we might have found rivers to swim in. Alas, of many Christians it must be affirmed that they have been naked, and poor, and miserable, when they might in the power of the Holy Spirit have been clad in golden garments, and have been rich and increased in goods. He waiteth to be gracious, but we linger in indifference, like those of whom we read, "They could not enter in because of unbelief." There are many such cases, and therefore it is not improper that I should with all vehemence press home upon you the question of the apostle, "Have ye received the Holy Ghost since ye believed?" Did ye receive him when ye believed? Are ye receiving him now that ye are believing in Christ Jesus?

. . . Does any man know what the Spirit of God can make of him? I believe the greatest, ablest, most faithful, most holy man of God might have been greater, and abler, and more faithful, and more holy, if he had put himself more completely at the Spirit's disposal. Wherever God has done great things by a man, he has had power to do more had the man been fit for it. We are straitened in ourselves, not in God. O brothers, the church is weak today because the Holy Spirit is not upon her members as we could desire him to be. You and I are tottering along like feeble babes, whereas, had we more of the Spirit, we might walk without fainting, run without weariness, and even mount up with wings as eagles. Oh, for more of the anointing of the Holy Ghost whom Christ is prepared to give immeasurably unto us if we will but receive him! "

C. H. Spurgeon, Receiving the Holy Ghost, No. 1790, Vol 30, Year 1884, p. 386, (Acts 19:2)

In answer to the question about laying on of hands. It is clear from the biblical accounts that some people did receive the Spirit when others prayed for them with hands laid on. Many also received the Spirit in other ways, with the Spirit often being described as “falling” on people. I do believe that laying on of hands is often very helpful and instrumental in a person receiving the Spirit, but we must not put God into a box on this issue. I have received touches from the Holy Spirit through hands being laid on me, but have also experienced his touch when alone in my room or walking in the woods. We should neither despise laying on of hands, nor make it into a law that all must receive the Spirit that way.

When it comes to tongues, my position is complex. Nowhere in the Bible does it state that it is impossible to receive the Spirit without speaking in tongues. Therefore we should not go further than Scripture on this point. I have already outlined that I believe that tongues is not the core element to this experience. The baptism of the Spirit is more about receiving a strong sense of the love of God and assurance of our salvation (see Ephesians 1, Romans 5, Romans 8). It should result in a welling up of praise to God. Tongues is part of the overflow of that experience, but may not be experienced by everyone. On the other hand, it is interesting to note that almost every time the Spirit is received in Acts, tongues and prophecy are the result. Therefore I think we are not wrong to expect tongues and prophecy, and to ask for them, and as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 14, to eagerly desire spiritual gifts. Paul himself says in that chapter that he wants all of his readers to speak in tongues, and especially to prophecy. Thus, I think we should not settle for an experience of the Spirit that makes his gifts optional and is relaxed about whether or not we receive them. Let’s press the Spirit to give all he has for us!

In one of those God-incidences, just as I am exploring the Holy Spirit more deeply here on the blog, Newfrontiers USA have redesigned their website and made the audio of the Newfrontiers USA Church Leadership Conference available even before it has finished. There are also a number of older messages there which include a whole series on the Holy Spirit. This is a great site for you if you are intrigued and want to find out more about the Holy Spirit and/or leadership in Reformed Charismatic churches.

Other helpful websites from Newfrontiers include Terry Virgo's other messages, and the Brighton Conference Audio, all of which give you ample opportunities to listen online or download some talks and burn a few CDs. Technology is a wonderful thing.

Last Friday I shared a quote from John Piper on the baptism with the Holy Spirit. In it he quoted an illustration that Martyn Lloyd-Jones used. Today, partly because I am working through a series of questions a reader has posed, I thought I would share another quote from Dr. Piper which might surprise some of my readers.

"I would start by saying that in the book of Acts, everywhere the receiving of the Holy Spirit is described, it is experiential. What I mean is that it's not just a logical inference that you know has happened to you only because something else has happened. Instead, it has effects that are clearly discernible. In the book of Acts a person knows when he receives the Holy Spirit. It is an experience with effects you can point to.

Let me illustrate this from Acts 19:2. The situation is that Paul has come to Ephesus and found there some disciples who, as it turns out, only know the baptism of John the Baptist and have not been baptized into the name of Jesus. Paul detects something wrong and breaks the whole thing open by asking a key question in verse 2: "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?"

Now that is a remarkable question for contemporary American evangelicals who have been taught by and large that the way you know you have received the Holy Spirit is that you are a believer. We have been told that you can know that you have the Holy Spirit because all who believe have the Holy Spirit. It's a logical inference. So if we want to know if someone has received the Holy Spirit, we would ask, "Have you believed on Jesus?" If the answer is yes, then we know the person received the Holy Spirit. Receiving the Holy Spirit is a logical inference, not an experience to point to.

But Paul's question isn't like that, is it? Paul says, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" We scratch our heads and say, "I don't get it, Paul. If you assume we believed, why don't you assume we received the Holy Spirit? We've been taught that all who believe receive the Holy Spirit. We've been taught to just believe that the Spirit is there whether there are any effects or not. But you talk as if there is a way to know we've received the Holy Spirit different from believing. You talk as if we could point to an experience of the Spirit apart from believing in order to answer your question."

And that is, in fact, the way Paul talks. When he asks, "Did you receive the Spirit when you believed?" he expects that a person who has "received the Holy Spirit" knows it, not just because it's an inference from his faith in Christ, but because it is an experience with effects that we can point to.

That is what runs all the way through this book of Acts. All the explicit descriptions of receiving the Holy Spirit are experiential (not inferential)."

— John Piper, 1991
What Does it Mean to Receive the Holy Spirit?

Today I'm launching a new feature which I'm going to call "Ask a Blogger." One day most weeks I will be posting one or more questions I have been asked. These questions can literally be about anything. To submit a question e-mail me at adrian.warnock@gmail.com. I will then endeavor to answer the questioner, although my answers will often be quite short. Today, however this is not the case! In fact, this week’s “Ask a Blogger” will run for a few days, although I will interrupt it to share a Piper Friday and an MLJ Monday.

The plan for some of my answers to be short is deliberate as I would like to give you, my readers, a chance to expand on my answers, or indeed to disagree with them! If you have a blog, simply post your answer with a link back to the post and I will try to track them, adding the best ones to the post. If you don't have a blog, feel free to e-mail your answers at adrian.warnock@gmail.com and I may post some of the best replies. Think of it as a community pooling its knowledge to try and come up with the best answers.

This week’s questions are on a subject dear to my heart, although it is one that I'm sure many of my readers would disagree strongly with me about.

I received the following e-mail from a reader who will remain anonymous. In it, my correspondent refers to a message he has listened to on the subject of receiving the Holy Spirit by Terry Virgo, which is available to download or to play right here on my blog:


I will share the entire e-mail, and will answer my readers’ questions as we go through them, spreading this to several days worth of blogging.

Dear Adrian,

I wonder if you might be available to answer a few questions on baptism with the Holy Spirit. I listened to a talk by Terry Virgo on the baptism, and have also appreciated your series of posts.

They have come at a very "coincidental" time in my life. I have grown up conservative as conservative can be. I feel a bit like John's disciples, believing, but never having received the Holy Spirit (see Acts 19). Even as recently as three months ago I was trying to convince someone that a second baptism isn't necessary. And then, in the last two months, God has done an amazing work in my life to open my eyes to the very possibility that the gifts are still for today and that there is a second baptism. It makes sense, especially after reading Acts, that I am missing something. I read about the boldness and the courage and the suffering, and I feel like I am missing something. (It feels blasphemous to even talk about it—I even wrote a seminary paper on how tongues is not for today!) So, I humbly come before you as a minister for many years, to ask if you could answer a few questions for me:

1. What is your experience in being baptized by the Holy Spirit?
First of all, let me say that my own experience is not in any sense “normative” for other Christians. I have known people to receive the Spirit in many different ways. I first received the Holy Spirit as a young child. I had made some kind of commitment to God a few years previously and was convinced that I was a “proper Christian.” I had been trying to persuade my family of this fact, and of my genuine desire to follow Jesus by wanting to be baptized. They felt I was quite young. The event I now describe convinced my parents that I could, indeed, be baptized, since I had now received the Holy Spirit even as they had.

I was in a children's meeting at the Downs Bible Week (an early Newfrontiers event). No one laid hands on me. No one prayed for me. We were simply worshiping. We had been taught that worshiping with raised hands was like forming a funnel through which God could pour his blessing on us. Suddenly I was aware of a warmth inside me. I was conscious of the presence of God. I felt his love. I knew that he had chosen me and marked me out as one of his own. I felt joy well up within me. I was so full of this experience that I found my words just run out. I knew not how to express myself in English as I was so overwhelmed. All I knew was that the words of the song we were singing no longer felt adequate to express my worship and love for the God whose love for me I was now feeling so tangibly. I found that my mouth began to utter strange sounds, although I was not really focused on them. It was as though my English words having run out, God was helping me to praise him with these strange new words. A friend of mine at the time was similarly so overcome that when our break time arrived, he couldn't ask for what sweets and drinks he wanted—all that came out was these strange sounds we called “tongues”! I have had many such experiences since, and each of them have had at their core a feeling of being specially loved and accepted by God.

I will continue with my correspondent's next question on Saturday.

This week Terry Virgo shared a couple of interesting anecdotes about Piper, Lloyd-Jones, and the Holy Spirit. This made me think that I should restart "Piper Fridays" here on the blog. So, here is a quote from a Piper sermon that refers to something else the Doctor said about the baptism of the Spirit.

Back in 2005 I cited another quote from John Piper which makes clear his commitment to the Doctor's doctrine of baptism with the Holy Spirit. Indeed, Piper even says, "We could talk for hours about what that experience is. In fact, most of my messages are just that—descriptions of the experience of the Spirit of God in the life of the believer." It is striking that to the young Piper, he believed most of his messages where about what the Holy Spirit did in the hearts of believers experientially. It seems he must be referring to the central doctrine of his life's work—Chrisitan hedonism. Anyway, back to the quote I wanted to share today:

"Let me use an illustration from Martin Lloyd-Jones in his book Joy Unspeakable to describe the difference between common Christian living and what happens when the Holy Spirit "clothes" a person with power or "comes upon" a person with this unusual power.

He says it is like a child walking along holding his father's hand. All is well. The child is happy. He feels secure. His father loves him. He believes that his father loves him but there is no unusual urge to talk about this or sing about it. It is true and it is pleasant.

Then suddenly the father startles the child by reaching down and sweeping him up into his arms and hugging him tightly and kissing him on the neck and whispering, "I love you so much!" And then holding the stunned child back so that he can look into his face and saying with all his heart, "I am so glad you are mine." Then hugging him once more with unspeakable warmth and affection. Then he puts the child down and they continue their walk.

This, Lloyd-Jones says, is what happens when a person is baptized with the Holy Spirit. A pleasant and happy walk with God is swept up into an unspeakable new level of joy and love and assurance and reality that leaves the Christian so utterly certain of the immediate reality of Jesus that he is overflowing in praise and more free and bold in witness than he ever imagined he could be.

The child is simply stunned. He doesn't know whether to cry or shout or fall down or run, he is so happy. The fuses of love are so overloaded they almost blow out. The subconscious doubts—that he wasn't thinking about at the time, but that pop up every now and then—are gone! And in their place is utter and indestructible assurance, so that you know that you know that you know that God is real and that Jesus lives and that you are loved, and that to be saved is the greatest thing in the world. And as you walk on down the street you can scarcely contain yourself, and you want to cry out, "My father loves me! My father loves me! O, what a great father I have! What a father! What a father!"

. . . I think this is basically what happened at Pentecost. And has happened again and again in the life of the church."

— John Piper: You Shall Receive Power, 1990

Today I thought I would share a very provocative quote from the good Doctor. I would be very interested in my readers' thoughts on this passage. If you have a blog, feel free to quote this, link to it, and tell us what you think. If you don't have one, and have some thoughts you'd like to share with me, drop me an e-mail at adrian.warnock@gmail.com. The quote is clear enough to stand on its own without any further explanation from me.

"There is nothing, I am convinced, that so ‘quenches’ the Spirit as the teaching which identifies the baptism of the Holy Ghost with regeneration. But it is a very commonly held teaching today, indeed it has been the popular view for many years. It is said that the baptism of the Holy Spirit is ‘nonexperimental’, that it happens to every one at regeneration. So we say, ‘Ah well, I am already baptized with the Spirit; it happened when I was born again, at my conversion; there is nothing for me to seek, I have got it all’. Got it all? Well, if you have ‘got it all’, I simply ask in the Name of God, why are you as you are? If you have ‘got it all’, why are you so unlike the Apostles, why are you so unlike the New Testament Christians?

The teaching that I have just mentioned is false. The apostles were regenerate before the day of Pentecost. The baptism of the Holy Ghost is not identical with regeneration; it is something separate. It matters not how long the interval between the two may be, there is a difference; there is an interval, they are not identical. But if you say that they are identical, you do not expect anything further. And if you do not believe that it is possible for you to experience the Spirit of God bearing direct witness with your own spirit that you are a child of God, obviously you are quenching the Spirit. That is why so many Christian people are miserable and unhappy; they do not know anything about crying out, ‘Abba, Father’; or about ‘the Spirit of adoption’. God is a Being away in the far distance; they do not know Him as a loving Father; they do not know that they are His children. They may believe it intellectually, theoretically; but Paul says, ‘You have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear’. We are not to go about groaning and wondering whether we are Christians or not. We were in that state under the law; then we were wretched and we cried out, ‘O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me?’ But no longer! ‘We have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry’—and it is an elemental cry that comes from the depth of the personality—‘Abba, Father’."

David Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Christian Warfare: An Exposition of Ephesians 6:10-13, 280 (Edinburgh; Carlisle, PA, Banner of Truth Trust, 1976).

UPDATE
So far we have four responses to this quote. First up is my buddy, Chris, who—with suitable reluctance considering the stature of the Doctor—makes clear that he disagrees. Meanwhile, Craig Bennett has been persuaded by the Doctor. Henry can see both sides, while Gary finds me frustrating and stimulating—and incidentally quite correctly points out that the Doctor was not a charismatic, as well as advancing some of the strongest arguments against the Doctor's position. Gary, I don't intend to imply that the Doctor was in my "camp"—I quote many people from all kinds of backgrounds and I often quote people expressing positions I don't personally hold.

No. 7 on the list of most-read posts on this blog appeared on November 26, 2005, and endeavored to explain that curious phenomenon—a charismatic Calvinist or "reformed charismatic." There was a time when we were considered an oddity and people doubted our existence. Now, at least in England, reformed charismatics are on the ascendancy and many Christians are intrigued by us.

With the resurgence of interest in things reformed and charismatic, I thought I'd post a bit on what I feel is a "reformed charismatic." Simply put, reformed charismatics are those people who are trying to foster a convergence by taking the best that is available from both charismatics and reformed people. If, like me, you are convinced of the following points, you might be a reformed charismatic:

• Mark Dever and Rick Warren both have useful things to say to the Church.
  
  
• C. J. Mahaney is an acceptable person to preach from a pulpit normally filled by John MacArthur.
  
  
• You like reading blogs by Tim Challies and Phil Johnson, but also by the pneuma bloggers.
  
  
• You like the Alpha Course, and enjoy reading Spurgeon and Piper.
  
  
• You just don't see why there is such anger between certain charismatics and some of their reformed brothers. At the same time you still believe that there really is a truth to discover.
  
  
• You are in a reformed church, but secretly long for more of an experience of God. You are in a charismatic church, but secretly enjoy listening to preaching and reading books that teach substantial theology.

In a sense reformed charismatics are occupying the center ground. Like "new Labor," they advocate a third way. It is really possible, they say, to pursue a solid biblical knowledge and sound doctrine while experiencing the presence and the power of God in a real way today. The Word and the Spirit are not in conflict, but rather work together to cause us to know God.

The charismatics believe in a God who is alive and acts today. We believe in a God who wants a personal relationship with his followers, who hears prayers, who reveals himself, who pours out his love into our hearts, and who never changes and is the same God of the Bible today. We believe that receiving the Holy Spirit is a conscious real experience. We believe that this experience of the Spirit is one of the major ways that God gives us assurance that we are saved.

The reformed believe in the solas of the reformation, and in the classical evangelical position on the gospel. We believe that man is so dead in his sin and facing the wrath of God that he requires a work that entirely originates in God to deal with it.

Read more . . . What is a Reformed Charismatic?

The following passage from the Doctor is a bit reminiscent of an old post of mine entitled, "I Want It All!"

". . . the trouble has generally been . . . that people have emphasised either experience or doctrine at the expense of the other . . . This is something that has been happening in the church from almost the very beginning . . .

When the whole emphasis is placed upon one or the other, you either have a tendency to fanaticism and excess or a tendency toward a barren intellectualism and a mechanical and a dead kind of orthodoxy . . .

As you read the stories of Luther and Calvin and other reformation fathers you will find that they began to fight this war on two fronts. They were fighting a dead, mechanical intellectualism on one hand, and they had to fight these other people who were running to excess and riot on the other.

Then in the seventeenth century you find the same kind of thing in connection with the Puritan movement . . . There were three main sections . . . in the middle you had people like the great John Owen and Thomas Goodwin in London, who constantly emphasised what they regarded as the only true scriptural position . . . which emphasises Spirit and doctrine, experience and definition. You must not say it is either/or; it is both. These, too, had to wage a warfare constantly on the two fronts. They had to fight the dead, barren intellectualism of many in Anglicanism and in the ranks of Puritanism, and the wild excesses of the early Quakers and various others . . .

As Evangelicals we find ourselves fighting on two fronts. We are obviously critical of a pure intellectualism and of a dead mechanical church which lacks any life . . . the gospel of Jesus Christ is a life-giving gospel. That is one side; but on the other side we see certain tendencies and we see certain excesses and we say "believe not every spirit, but try the spirits to see whether they are of God." And thus we seem to be opposing everything, and so we receive criticism from all sides . . .

For myself, as long as I am charged by certain people with being nothing but a Pentecostalist ,and on the other hand charged by others with being an intellectual, a man who is always preaching doctrine, as long as the two criticisms come, I am very happy. But if one or the other of the two criticisms should ever cease, then, I say, is the time to be careful and to begin to examine the very foundations.

The position of Scripture . . . is one which is facing two extremes. The Spirit is essential, and experience is vital. However, truth and definition and doctrine and dogma are equally vital and essential. And our whole position is one which proclaims that experience which is not based solidly upon truth and doctrine is dangerous."

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Life in Christ: Studies in 1 John, pp. 400-403.

UPDATE
My new pal, Chris, has published the following two quotes on this subject:

“Because some wings of the church have appealed to experience over against revelation, or have talked glibly about ill-defined ‘spirituality’ that is fundamentally divorced from the gospel, some of us have overreacted and begin to view all mention of experience as suspicious at best, perverse at worst. This overreaction must cease. The Scriptures themselves demand that we allow more place for experience than that. . .”

D.A. Carson, A Call to Spiritual Reformation: Priorities From Paul and His Prayers, Grand Rapids (Baker, 1992), p. 191.

Relative to Romans 5:5, Moo writes:

“The confidence we have for the day of judgment is not based only on our intellectual recognition of the fact of God’s love, or even only on the demonstration of God’s love on the cross . . . but on the inner, subjective certainty that God does love us . . . and it is this internal, subjective, yes, even emotional, sensation within the believer that God does indeed love us - - love expressed and made vital in real, concrete actions on our behalf - - that gives to us the assurance that ‘hope will no disappoint us.’”

Douglas Moo, Commentary on Romans, pp. 312-313.