Allan Svensson
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 Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 3:17 pm Post subject: The Promise of the Spirit that Jesus "forgot" |
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The Promise of the Spirit that Jesus "forgot"
The Pentecostalists have preached about the baptism with the Holy
Spirit and they are proud and mean that the Pentecost Revival has
conveyed this truth. Nevertheless, it was God's Spirit himself who
revealed this truth, and he did it before the Pentecost Movement
existed.
Please, observe what the apostle Peter says on the day of Pentecost.
He says that they would receive the Holy Spirit as a gift. Observe,
it is the Holy Spirit himself that is the gift. Accordingly, it is not
only the experience of the baptism with the Holy Spirit that is the
gift. Gal. 3:2. (Here is the Swedish Bible more plain).
Please, observe also when they received the gift, already the same
day! They were not needed to wait for the gift for several months or
years. And when they received the Spirit as a gift, what happened
then? Then they received the new life in Christ and were born again!
When you are born again, you are born of the Spirit. John 3:8.
Do you now understand what that implies? It implies that the truth
of the baptism with the Holy Spirit has been valid all the time ever
since the apostles received this gift! Many Christians think that the
baptism with the Holy Spirit was forgotten during a very long time,
and that it was not until the 20th century, that Jesus did resume this
activity to baptize the believers with the Holy Spirit.
Such an opinion is quite contrary to the Bible. The truth is, that
Jesus all the time has baptized his people with the Holy Spirit.
And we need not search in any old history books to find out it
because it is written clearly in the Bible! For the promise is unto
you, and your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many
as the Lord our God shall call. Acts 2:39.
Do you think that Jesus forgot this promise of God after any
hundreds of years, and right until the beginning of the 20th century?
In that case all the Christians who have lived during all these
centuries would have not got the Holy Spirit that God had promised.
Eph. 1:13. Yet, the promise of the Spirit was valid for those as well
as for us, and as well as for the first Christians! As many as the
Lord our God shall call. "And the purpose of it all was that the
blessing of Abraham should in Jesus Christ be extended to the
Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through
faith." Gal. 3:14. (The New English Bible).
Acts 2:33. Eph. 1:13.
What Peter told on the day of Pentecost has functioned all the
time since then. When people have done repent and been baptized
in the name of Jesus Christ, then they have also received the
promised Spirit as a gift. In John 14:16-17 Jesus says, "And I will
pray the Father, and he shall give you another Comforter, that he
may abide with you for ever; Even the Spirit of truth; whom the
world cannot receive, because it seeth him not, neither knoweth
him: but ye know him; for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in
you " Ever since Jesus' first disciples received the Holy Spirit on
the day of Pentecost; the Holy Spirit has been present in the
Assembly of God all the time.
They have preached that the gift to speak in tongues, is the only
sure "sign" of the baptism by the Holy Spirit. It is not true. Please,
read Acts the 2nd chapter. There we see that the first sign was,
a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled
all the house where they were sitting. This was a very clear sign
of the baptism by the Holy Spirit.
The second sign that is mentioned was, tongues like as of fire,
and it sat upon each of them. This was also a clear sign of the
baptism by the Holy Spirit. And the third sign was that they
began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them
utterance. It was usually earthly languages that the people
understood. As we can see in the Bible, there were people in
Jerusalem with several languages and each one heard them
speaking in his own native language. (All speaking in tongues
is not of this sort. Please, read 1 Cor. 14th Chapter).
Here we have three clear signs of baptism by the Holy Spirit.
Two signs that everyone heard; a sound from heaven as of a
rushing mighty wind, and speaking in tongues; and one sign
that they could see, tongues of fire. Why have many been so
fixed at just the speaking in tongues, as if this were the only
sure sign of the baptism by the Holy Spirit?
There is a doctrine that says that everyone who is baptized by
the Holy Spirit must speak in tongues. This doctrine cannot be
proved with help of the Bible because this doctrine is not
pronounced anywhere in the Bible. Those who stand up for
this doctrine, they do in the same way as those who stand up
for the so-called infant baptism. They take out some quotations
from the Bible and try to find out a proof of their own doctrine.
Both this doctrine and the doctrine about the so-called infant
baptism are like sleeping-tablets. These doctrines hinder people
to free thinking, and hinder them to study of the Bible.
Some Christians have written letters to me in defence of this
wrong doctrine. Of all their arguments, I have found no one that
stands before God's word. And of what I have written about the
baptism by the Holy Spirit, they have not been able to refute
anything.
The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God's
children. Rom.8:16. This, that we experience the testifying
of the Holy Spirit in our hearts, is a sure sign that we have
received the promised Spirit. Gal. 3:14. I had this sign long
before I got the gift to speak in tongues. But while I was in
the Pentecostal Movement I heard repeatedly that I was not
baptized with the Holy Spirit. Sometimes they said that I was
it, and sometimes they said I was not. When I had left the
Pentecostal Movement I also received the gift to speak in
tongues.
Allan Svensson
Do you want to read the continuation of this article
or if you have any questions
Please, visit my Web Site
http://www.algonet.se/~allan-sv/CONTENTS.HTM
(Article 24)
God's Spirit gives us life
http://www.algonet.se/~allan-sv/PAGE26.HTM |
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